Of Kingdoms and Princes
by Malachite Aoi
Summary: Yuffie is the princess of Wutai. Vincent is the Crown Prince of Nibelheim. Reno is just a royal pain. What's a girl to do? AU
1. Frustration

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII and all of its scenarios, characters, places and stuff are property of Square-Enix and their intellectual owners. Not me. So don't sue. Also, this song was inspired by the song "Two Princes" by Spin Doctors. Try it, you might like it. Peace.

Vincent Valentine was a royal prince of the great prospering country called Nibelheim. Yuffie Kisaragi was a princess of the ancient civilization of Wutai. Reno is just a royal pain in the ass. What's a girl to do?

Godo Kisaragi was getting old. The great leader of Wutai was aging, slowly but surely, and more eager than ever to find a suitable man to aid his daughter in soon becoming ruler of the ancient country. He considered his daughter something of a wastrel, constantly out and about looking for materia, rather than staying in the country and learning to lead her people as he had done for so many years. Kisaragi-sama was tired and looking forward to stepping down soon after his daughter was old enough AND settled down to a good husband, who would help his less than level-headed daughter make good decisions for her country. Many suitors had come and gone, enticed by the childish charm of Yuffie's youthful face, but quickly repelled by the matching immature take on life. Godo was beginning to give up hope as the options kept dwindling. Zack Adams of Gongaga had looked to be the best choice of the suitors thus far, until an anxious Rufus Shinra has strong-armed him into hiding, where Zack met a beautiful commoner girl he ended up betrothed to, named Aeris. Yet for all of young Rufus' troubles, upon meeting the little ninja, he quickly lost interest.Barret Wallace of Corel was much too course to run the delicate country of Wutai. Cloud Strife of Mideel had just recently married Princess Tifa Lockheart of Kalm. Everyone knew that Cid Highwind of Rocket Town, though still officially unmarried, was more or less tied down to his housemate Shera by common law. And despite the unrivaled knowledge and sage of Nanaki of Cosmo Canyon, he could not imagine his daughter settling down with the childhood friend she considered to be something of a pet. The list went on and on, and troubled old man Kisaragi day in and day out as he mused on just how doomed he considered his beloved country, soon to be left in the hands of that sprite of a girl, and at best, a man whose name was to be pulled out of a hat, if this continued.

Yuffie, on the other hand, seemed a little less than concerned about the future of her country in relation to her ability to get married. More than once had they butted heads about marriage and why it carried such a great importance in her ascention to the throne. Every time they argued she would throw a fit about how she knew she was more than capable of running a country without some lug at her side telling her what to do. And ever more came the retaliation that to make a good impression on her countrymen she needed to present a strong image, which included that of being not only a wife, but someday a mother as well. This comment usually resulted in the young girl sputtering and storming out of the King's room and into her own.

Tonight had been no different. Rude Sparks of the Turks had written a letter inquiring about the maritual status of the young princess, and expressing a slight interest in meeting the girl. Godo had called his daughter in and told her that she was to be meeting the young Mr. Sparks this Thursday, just as a trial, to see if the young man could even tolerate her bull-headedness for an hour or so.

"With all due respect, _taishou_, I don't see why I hafta go and meet this stiff!"

Godo groaned exasperatedly at his daughter and raised up off of his mat, pointing an accusing finger at the squirrely girl before him.

"If you had not failed to already acquire a proper husband by now then you would not have to continue going to meet these men! I cannot seem to get it through your head why it is so important to me that you marry well and take care of Wutai the way I have for all of my life. I have no son! I must rely on you to take care of this country when it is finally time for me to step down and take my place amongst those who lead normal lives."

"But Pops! I'm sure that I can run a crummy country by myself! I don't need some guy tellin' me what to do while I prance around in a kimono and do nothing all day!"

"I am NOT having this discussion with you again Yuffie. I do not care if you like it, I do not care if you do not want to go. You will go and meet Rude Sparks whether you are willing or not! I will have Himiko dress you in your nicest kimono, and you will go there and impress him the best you can!"

"I don't have to do a damn thing you tell me! I'm not some stupid hunk of meat to be given to the highest bidder or whatever! I'm your daughter! Don't you give a damn?"

She did not give Godo the time to respond as she stormed out of the room, slamming the rice-paper door behind her.

The old king sighed headily to himself and wondered drearily how he would ever survive these passing years.

All of Wutai was silent beneath the moonless sky. It was something close to perhaps three in the morning when a young ninja princess decided to sneak out of the royal palace to go for a walk. The musty halls of the Kisaragi Palace reeked of incense and old people to the young girl. the wafting odors clogged her mind and rendered her more thoughtless than she already was. It was when the cold night air hit her that she could finally breathe and think a bit clearer than she would have under the aforementioned circumstances. She was tired of her father always harping on her about getting married and maturing so that she could inherit the throne. She was just a kid! She had no desire whatsoever to rule a stupid country! Espescially a country where she felt like she didn't belong. Ever since she was a child she could remember the ladies of the palace, and even most of the common women, walking around in kimonos, carrying lacquered umbrellas to keep the sun off of their pale, delicate faces. But she, even as a princess, would hastily throw on the kind of clothes only a commoner in a big city like Midgar would wear, and throw a shuriken over her shoulder to go hunting in the fields for fiends that might reward her with some materia.

The palace ladies would giggle behind their hands about her most unlady-like behavior, and chide her when she returned, slathering creams and tonics on her to keep her as porcelain looking as the rest of the Wutain women. None of this changed the fact that she couldn't stand it.

And now that she was older, all her father wanted her to do was dress up in fancy kimono, paint her face like a courtly woman, and meet these wealthy, powerful men so she could get hitched and get to work on running this hellhole.

"I bet he isn't even cute!"

"Bet who isn't cute?"

A shuriken flashed in the air and pinned a surprised Reeve Tuesti to a shop wall before he could continue his commentary.

"Reeve!"

The young ninja yanked the shuriken out of his coat and brushed off the startled man.

"I was only kidding, no need to skewer me!"

"I'm sorry Reeve! I had no idea you knew I was out here!"

"It's fine. You know, I would lecture you about how the beautiful princess of Wutai shouldn't be outside at this time of night alone, but with those reflexes, I doubt there is much to worry over."  
"Hehehe...I try."

"So, what brings you out here so late Princess? This is no time to be materia-hunting. There are probably more muggers out here at this time of night than there are fiends!"

"I'm not hunting Reeve, I'm running, Pops set me up on another stupid meeting with some guy, that might wanta marry me."

"Who is it this time?"

"Rude Sparks."

"Of the Turks? Wow, fine young man. Not quite the talkative one, but I guess you more than compensate for someone as taciturn as he is."

Reeve's remark didn't even garner a grin from the upset little ninja in front of him.

"That's not funny Reeve. I don't wanna get married!"

"Now now. Just because you have to meet him, doesn't mean you're going to marry him! Just do as your father tells you to...ah-ah...and appease him by just trying."

This only made the ninja frown in consternation. She didn't want to admit it, but Reeve was right. Meeting a guy didn't mean insta-marriage.

"Fine, I guess."

"That's a good girl. Now how about we head back to the palace and drink a cup of warm sake before bed? There's no use fretting over the inevitable."

Yuffie, though sulky and brooding, followed Reeve back to the palace, glancing back over her shoulder at the twinkling stars above.

"Do me a favor, wouldja? Grant me this one wish...I wish..."

Godo Kisaragi was having an unusually good day today. So far there were no major mishaps with the public, his daughter had told him, though sulkily, that she would meet Rude, and another offer poured in from another member of world royalty. A lush-looking red envelope, made of the finest parchment paper and sealed with wax the color of the deepest shade of black sat on the matress. The letter was written in elegant script, addressed to King Godo Kisaragi of Wutai, from Crown Prince Vincent Valentine of Nibelheim. The royal family had come into power quite recently, but established itself as a force to be reckoned with. What used to be a small, rural country was turned into a prosperous, strong nation under the Valentine family.

He didn't really know much about the Crown Prince really, except that the man lived in a lush mansion, and had somehow lost his arm serving in a war, but had it replaced with some type of prostethic. Similar to Barret, but not quite. One other thing he knew about the Valentines in general, was that they were shapeshifters. But in a world such as theirs, this was not regarded as unusual.

Kisaragi-sama liked what he knew about the young man. Quiet. Thoughtful. Strong. A good leader. And as a bonus, a man that had seen military service, which was always a plus when it came to running countries and women. He almost wanted to promise his young daughter to the man on the spot, based off of what little he knew. However, the letter had only said a few well-chosen words about whether or not young Yuffie was married, and if Godo would be interested in trying to get the princess to meet him. He chucked lightly to himself imagining such a stern young man coupled with his rascal of a daughter, but was more determined than ever to get her wed. This meeting almost pushed the thought of meeting Rude Sparks from his mind. However, he knew that it wouldn't be a good idea to miff the leader of such a powerful clan, and decided that Yuffie would probably have no trouble scaring the man away anyhow.

"This, is looking to be a very good day..." Godo chuckled as he set the letter down and went down to the lower chambers for some tea.

Yuffie, after giving in to her father's demands at the behest of her caretaker, stormed back to her room in a foul mood, and soon fell into a fitful nap. Her sleep was haunted with terrifying images of being jammed into stuffy kimono and forced to eat fruit from her husband's hand like a lost bird, day in and day out. She awoke in a panicking cold sweat. But she knew the score and would do the same thing she always did - be herself. And she was sure he'd flee like a Midgar Zolom was chasing him.

Tuesday passed without incident. There was no talk between the two Kisaragis, there was hardly any contact at all. On Wednesday, Godo had Himiko take Yuffie out to the seamstress to try and find a suitable kimono for the coming day, but instructed Himiko to choose something unimpressive. Yuffie was quite surprised at hearing this, but thought nothing of it, attributing this odd quip to her father's slowly decaying mind. All the better anyway, since she had no intention of trying to impress anyone for any reason.

When she got home, Reeve was waiting for her, trying unsuccessfully to hide a knowing smile.

"Little Miss Kisaragi!" He chimed in a singsong voice.

Yuffie, who was in no mood to be playful, after trying on what seemed like a billion kimono, replied with a grumpy grunt.

"If you can swear to keep a secret, I'd be more than happy to share one with you..."

At the thought of a secret her eyes lit up like lanterns.

"Ooo! What is it? I promise I won't tell! I swear I won't!"

"This is a mighty big secret...and if word gets out, it could be my hide!" Reeve dragged a thumb across his throat to emphasize his point.

"Aww, come on! Ya know you can trust me!"

"Can I? How about I take your Throw Materia as collateral, in case you rat me out?"

This was Yuffie's favorite materia, and she pouted at the idea, but was too enticed by the prospect of a secret.

:"Fine! But if I don't squeal ya gotta give it back! You hear!"

"I'm just kidding, but I know I can trust you if you're willing to go through such lengths, so here, I'll tell you. You know your meeting with Mr. Sparks tomorrow?"

"Yeah, what of it?"

"Don't you think it's strange that your father seems to have lost most of his interest in it?"

"Maybe. I don't care. I just thought the old guy was cutting me a break!"

"Not quite my dear...he wants you to throw that proposal!"

"But why?"

"Because a certain VINCENT VALENTINE of NIBELHEIM has also expressed interest in you, Princess."

Yuffie's jaw dropped in utter surprise. The handsome, dark-haired, pale-skinned, Crown Prince of Nibelheim with the eyes to die for and the voice to kill for was interested in her!

"Reeve you're totally kidding me!"

"Not one bit missy!"

"Oh my God!"

Yuffie let out a wail that could probably be heard from the Northern Crater.  
"Shhh! You're going to get me in trouble!"

"Oh my God! With motivation like that, throwing a date couldn't be easier!"

Running, she threw herself at Reeve who spun her in a lazy circle and set her gently back down on the carpet and winked confidentially at her. She beamed at him and practically flew out of the room where Reeve remained, shaking his head and stroking his beard.

"This should make for an interesting story someday..."


	2. Unexpected

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII and all of its scenarios, characters, places and stuff are property of Square-Enix and their intellectual owners. Not me. So don't sue. Also, this fic was inspired by the song "Two Princes" by Spin Doctors. Try it, you might like it. Peace.

Back at the Turk headquarters, an unusually anxious Rude was pacing the length of his room at the prospect of meeting the young Wutain princess. Honestly, he had no intention of getting married...well, anymore. It wasn't too long after he mailed the letter to the King of Wutai that he sat down and thought about what a monumental change marriage would mean in his life. His bar would probably have to go down the tubes because a wife would never tolerate him in a bar. Furthermore, the more he thought about it, the less badass he felt. Just because he was the leader of a fierce organization, didn't mean that he wouldn't be a wuss for having a wife and maybe even...kids...someday. Not to mention they could be used against him if someone ever really wanted to go after him for some reason or another. It would have been his tenth circuit around the room when a lanky redhead stuck his leg out in front of his partner, tripping him and stopping his mini-marathon.

"Yo man, that's like, the millionth time you've gone around the room. What's your problem?"

"...I don't want to get married."

"Then don't. But stop pacing. You're driving me crazy, yo."

"You go."  
"What!"

"You go. I can't do it. I made a mistake. I never should have sent that letter to Kisaragi taishou."

"You're outta your mind partner! I ain't going for you!"

"Come on...you have to! I can't do this. But I can't stiff her either. Her father is one of the most powerful people on the planet! Can't you do me this one favor? Please Reno? Buddy? Partner?"

"Only on one condition."

"No..."

"Yes!"

Rude sulkily handed over his last pair of sunglasses to Reno, who proceeded to stomp on them and walk out of the room with a satisfied grin on his face.

When the door shut and Reno's footsteps had faded, he pulled out a pair from the dresser drawer, which apparently, was full of them.

The next morning, Himiko had Yuffie up bright and early to get her properly dressed and made up for the coming day.

"Oh Yuffie-Chan, I have watched you grow up from a little baby to now a beautiful young woman, blossoming like the cherry blossom on the branch. I cannot tell you how proud and how happy I am to see you try and find a suitable husband."

Yuffie sleepily grunted in reply as her handmaid cinched the obi around her middle.

"Your father must care so much about you to go through all this trouble to find you a good husband. I know that he is twice as proud, if not more, than I am of his daughter. There!"

It never failed to amaze the young girl how radically different she looked dressed up in that garish outfit, and painted up like some doll. She could never quite decide if it made her look pretty and mature, or strange and fake. When she turned to the mirror, she still could not make up her mind.

_Regardless of how I feel, I hafta totally throw this proposal! Otherwise I got no hope with that babelicious Crown Prince of Nibelheim!_

She smiled to herself and let Himiko lead her out to the main chamber.

Her father nodded and smiled his approval, and waved her out of the palace. Reeve, her father's faithful advisor and her confidant, rode along with her to Costa del Sol where she was supposed to meet her potential husband. Her heart twittered in her chest the whole way there, and she swore that no matter what happened, she would not give him the pleasure of liking her. Reeve, sensing the girl's anxiety, tried his best to distract her with banter and silly games, taking her mind off the situation at hand. He knew her thoughts and was troubled with the idea that he might have said too much in letting her know that Vincent Valentine was interested. Either way, he knew he could not remedy whatever damage had been caused, and vowed to do his best to help her, since he felt partially responsible for the nervousness she felt at having to mess up this one on purpose.

Upon arriving at Costa del Sol, they headed straight for the dock where Rude was supposedly going to meet them to take them on a little cruise on his personal boat. Rude was not yet there, which is something that Reeve considered a little unusual for the man. Reeve had dealt with Rude before and noted that he was very punctual and proper, even for being something of what might be considered a brutish man. It was about fifteen minutes later, after Yuffie's incessant whining about how she felt like she was melting away that a bright red boat pulled up to the dock. Reeve took a step forward, ready to introduce young Princess Kisaragi to Rude for the first time, but was surprised when a wild-looking man with startling blue eyes and flaming red hair jumped out of the boat.

"Sorry I'm late, yo. My name is Re----ude Sparks. Pleased to make your acquaintance."

Reeve, still in shock, mouthed silently to the man. He knew him; this was Rude's partner, Reno Kobayashi-Kim.

_You're not Rude Sparks!_

_I know! I'll explain later._

"It's good to see you again Mr...Sparks. It's been a while."

"Yeah, no kiddin'."

"I'd like you to meet the young Princess, Yuffie Kisaragi of Wutai."

The redhead cast a cold blue eye upon the girl in front of him and jerked his head as a sign of acknowledgment.

"I, uh, heard lots of things about ya." She sputtered awkwardly.

"Yeah, well...that goes with bein' a Turk, ya know?"

"Yuffie, would you excuse Mr. Sparks and I for a second?"  
"Sure."

A very nervous Reeve escorted Reno off to the side and whispered to him hurriedly.

"Reno! What are you doing? Yuffie was supposed to meet Rude! Not you! If this is some joke or some game, I can promise you Kisaragi taishou will definitely not be pleased!"

"Don't get your panties in a bunch Reeve. Rude couldn't make it."  
"Why ever not?"

"Coz he got cold feet, yo. He realized that he didn't wanna get married and hafta give up this and that. So he asked me if I would come for him. Ain't no harm. All I gotta do is pretend to be Rude for a day and keep the kid from liking me. That's all."

Reeve was very worried and not quite convinced, but couldn't think of anything to say. It was as simple as that, he supposed. And Yuffie was holding out for Vincent Valentine anyway.

"I suppose there's no harm in that, but please be careful. This would be an absolute catastrophe if word got back to Kisaragi taishou..."

"i know, ya know? I got a reputation to protect too. So let's just get this over with, go home and forget about it. Aight?"

Reno went back to where Yuffie was standing with Reeve in tow. He extended an arm to the girl and ushered her to the boat with a charismatic smile plastered on his face.

Yuffie hated to admit it, but there was something faintly charming about the redhead who was supposed to woo her. She couldn't believe the color of his hair, or the luster of his eyes. Even the texture of his voice, even if not as deep and sonorous as that of Vincent, was smooth like vanilla ice cream, with a distinct gangster drawl to it.

_What am I thinking! I can't be thinking these things about this guy! I'm after Vinnie of Nibelheim! Get your head in the game Kisaragi!_

The boat ride had not been what Yuffie would have chosen for a date, had she been given the option. She spent most of the time hanging over the railing of the boat, puking what little she had eaten for breakfast that morning, into the warm ocean below. She hadn't realized that the reaches of her tendency towards motion sickness would extend this far, but sure enough from the moment she stepped on the boat, a queazy lightheadedness settled in over her like a blanket. She was sure that she had not cut an impressive figure to the young redhead steering the boat, most likely watching her with a disgusted eye, as time and time again she heaved a stomachful of tea and rice and other assorted goods, into the ocean.

It was true that Reno was keeping an eye on the young girl. And yes, every time he heard her gagging, it did kind of send off a wave of nausea into him. But he understood that people did get sick, after all, not everyone could be blessed with his strength and tenacity, and thus he was more concerned that one of these times, the poor girl was going to heave so hard that she was going to fall right into the ocean along with the contents of her stomach.

Reeve was standing anxiously in the cabin, playing out all the different ways this could go in his mind. In one instant he could be thinking that everything would be fine and that Yuffie would not have anything more to say about "Rude Sparks" other than his choice of date ideas "sucked", to use the young girl's vernacular. Yet at another moment he could almost smell himself roasting, as Kisaragi taisho put him under the red hot spotlight, once Yuffie had said something about Rude being...well...not Rude.

A bored voice interrupted his thoughts.

"What is your problem man? You been standin' there twitchin' since we started this lil adventure. And that girl of yours, Goofy, or whatever her name is, don't seem to be having too much fun herself."

"You will NOT refer to Princess YUFFIE like that!"

"Yeah fine. Yuf. Whatever. I say we turn this boat around and go get some food instead of dragging this on. You better go keep an eye on that Yuf-girl, before she falls into the ocean. I ain't jumping in to save her."

Reeve, in a gesture of despair and irritation, rubbed the palms of his hands against his temples and cheeks, and prayed to Leviathan to let everything come out okay.

After a violent ride back to Costa del Sol, where Reno had made such a sharp U-ey that both Yuffie and Reeve almost went catapulting over the railing, they tried to decide on what to eat. The young princess was still woozy and very wary of attempting to eat anything, but hadn't been this far out of Wutai in a long time, and appreciated the fact that she could try some new food, other than the bland rice and mixed dishes she got at home. Not to say that she couldn't have ordered a servant out to get her something new and good to try, it was just a different feeling, being able to do this on her own.

When Reno went to the bar to go order them some food, Yuffie asked if Reeve couldn't PHS someone to get her some new clothes. The kimono she was wearing reeked of vomit and sea water, and was making her sick as is. Not to mention it was as hot as a frying pan in the tropical resort, and she couldn't stand being bundled up.

"I had a feeling you might say something like that, but I don't think Kisaragi taishou would approve of you dressing in such a manner on such a...formal...occassion. So I took the liberty of bringing you some extra clothes myself."

Yuffie almost threw herself at Reeve to hug him as a sign of appreciation, but reconsidered when he recoiled from her first step at taking a lunge at him.

"Oh, right, I guess I should change first. But where?"

Reeve pointed her in the direction of an inn, where she could most certainly use their bathroom to change and freshen herself up before the meal. Just as Yuffie left, Reno returned, arms laden with three trays of take-out Mexican food and a couple of beers, along with a few sodas, considering he didn't know whether or not the kid could drink yet.

"Hey, where did Yuf go? Ain't she gonna help carry some of this?"

"Even IF the princess were here, she would NOT be expected to carry any of this. I will help you. But in the meantime, just wait patiently. She went to the restroom to try and clean herself up before lunch."

"Geez, all we're gonna do is sit down at the beach and eat some food, yo. Ain't like we're going on some high-class restaurant or somethin'."

Reno's jaw hit the floor, and the food almost followed suit, when the young ninja princess came out of the inn, long legs shining in the sun and all pale smooth skin exposed in her "city attire" of floral print tank top, covered by a vest, and short-shorts that accentuated the exquisite length and shape of her legs, even beneath the tall, white boots she wore.

"Oh jeez," The young Turk thought to himself, "I think I'm in love."


	3. Of Backstory and Backsides

Disclaimer: Still the same as last time kiddies! Everything belongs to Square-Enix, not me!

Vincent Valentine sat with one leg carefully balanced on the knee of the other, seated in a luxrious, plush, black leather chair. On his leg he held a small cup of coffee, while resting his claw arm on the armrest of said chair. He flexed the claws meditatively, pushing back memories of how he had lost the thing to begin with. It was a terrible war that he had taken place in, when he had been a member of that elite company called Shinra.

His parents, like all good royalty, strongly believed in the "Heir and a Spare" theorem. This cruel and unusual domestic set-up usually comprised of the King and Queen of a nation having two sons, one who would be raised to become the next king, and one who would be put into the military. The military son grew up with the knowledge that he would never rule the kingdom, unless of course the unthinkable happened and his brother died. This was a very rare occurance, and usually said brother ended up living a hard but simple life. However, this was not the case for Vincent.

Naturally, the king and queen of course had an older child, Vincent's older brother Seth. Seth was supposed to grow up and become the new king of Nibelheim, however, it did not happen quite that way.

Seth had always been a precocious and very sensitive child. He hid it well behind a very disciplined, and at the same time, badboy attitude; but when people said things that were about him, he tended to take it to heart, no matter how radical the claim.

It seemed as though Seth Valentine was also an emotional masochist, because he would spend hours and hours in the basement, pouring over magazines and tabloids that featured stories about his family.

One day, Seth, at the ripe age of twenty-five, read in a magazine, a disturbing article about the possibility of his mother not actually being his legitimate mother. It was a ludicrous claim of course, it would have been more feasible had they accused his father of not being his legitimate dad. However, Seth in all of his oversensitivity, bought into the tabloid rumours, and went crazy. He now believed that he was actually the son of his father's ex-consort, Geneva, and as a result, ran away from the kingdom only to be heard of years later.

According to the papers that Vincent's parents read, Geneva turned out to be a convict who was living in a prison all this time. Seth found her and broke her out of jail, only to end up being manipulated by this evil woman claming to be his mom. In the end, Seth and his "mother" were both caught hiding in the northernmost parts of the planet, and there were killed by a band of travelers that the two unsuccessfuly tried to rob.

This news of course devasted the royal couple; because their heir had not only died, but died never knowing the truth that Queen Valentine was in fact, his biological mother. Another terrifying fact was that the royal line was in danger of being demolished. While all this had transpired, Vincent was already serving in a war somewhere off in a foreign land, and the fact remained that if he got killed, there would be no heir to the Nibelheim throne.

Of course fate was not completely cruel to the royal family, and Vincent was given an honorable discharge when he lost him arm saving a comrade from a vicious back attack by one of his own allies. The Valentine family of course hired the best doctor money could buy, Dr. Hojo of Shinra's lab department, and had their son mended into fine condition. From that point on, Vincent was coddled and treated as though he had been the only son all along, because of his now-prominent role in keeping Nibelheim's crown in the Valentine bloodline.

Of course while Vincent had been away, there were many candidates eyeing the seemingly up-for-grabs crown, all of which were none too happy with the more or less safe return of the youngest Valentine son.

Tragedy would strike the poor boy, now a man, again, when his mother and father were brutally murdered in their very own country. He was shocked to discover that they had died fighting, and not as humans. It was then he discovered the dirty secret that he came from a long line of shapeshifters.

It was amazing that all these things had not overwhelmed the poor young man, who was now, at the age of twenty-seven, the Crown Prince of Nibelheim, an orphan, a shapeshifter, and the younger brother of a notorious psychopath. These things were why Vincent was rather apprehensive about sending the letter to Kisaragi-taishou inquiring about his daughter and her maritual status.

He realized as he sipped his coffee that he wasn't quite fond of the idea of getting married, however he wasn't opposed to it either. And he had not yet had enough experience with children to form a fair opinion on them. But he also knew that his parents had gone through a lot to keep the crown in the family, and that now was as good a time as ever to start looking for someone to make an heir with. His country was prospering. The support and morale of his people for their country and Crown Prince were high. They would accept a good marriage with open arms.

Of course Vincent feared that all of his secrets would spill out and dispel the King of Wutai from letting his daughter marry him, but there were other girls of course. But he was quite sure that he would like a young, quiet, timid woman like those of Wutai. Like the girl he had fallen in love with during the war but ultimately lost. Yes, a good Wutain wife is just what he needed.

Placing the empty cup on the table in front of him as he got up, Vincent Valentine took long strides back to his room to take a small midafternoon nap. All the thinking he had done had begun to give him a headache.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Yuffie Kisaragi had given Reno Kobayashi-Kim a headache.

He was practically crosseyed from constantly trying to steal glances at the girl out of the corner of his eye. They had been sitting on the beach downing drinks and Mexican food for quite a while now. He was afraid that the porcelain complexion of the dazzling girl sitting next to him in the sand was going to fry and blister angrily...yet on the other hand he thought of how she might look with a nice warm tan to add color to her luxuriously long legs and slender white arms. Reeve caught him looking at her as hungrily as a wolf and felt his stomach sink to his knees. He could barely eat more than two tacos, though his beer consumption rate was at an all-time high, considering all the hot water he could imagine he was going to be in.

_If only I had been smarter...the moment I knew it wasn't Rude I should have turned right around and left! Told Kisaragi-taishou that Rude was sick and couldn't make it. I never should have agreed to this, and now, oh Leviathan I am doomed._

It would not have been so bad if it had only been Reno eyeing Yuffie surreptitiously out of the corner of his eye, but he had also noticed the more frequent and very curious looks that the young ninja had been trying slyly to shoot back at the redhead.

Reno had decided that as good as she would look with a tan, he liked that pearl-like quality to her skin much better. He stood up, dusting the sand off his pants, and grabbed the young girl by the wrist and yanked her up. She stumbled and fell clumsily into Reno's arms, quickly pulling away and blushing furiously

"Hey! What's the big idea?"

"I just thought we should get you outta the sun princess, your skin's gonna burn like chicken in hot oil...you're all pasty and don't even got sunblock on I bet."

Reno scratched his head nervously, realizing how attatched he must sound.  
"Not that I care or anything, just don't want your dad blowing a gasket or somethin' for me damaging his precious goods..."

He inwardly smirked at the idea of damaging Kisaragi-taishou's goods alright.

Reeve caught the wicked gleam in his eye and interruped their little interlude with a prominent clearing of his throat.

"Anyway...I think it's time that we got our young princess home. Right Yuffie?"

Yuffie noticed as Reeve silently mouthed the name Vincent Valentine at her, and felt herself redden and her heart skip a beat or two at just the thought of him. However, when she looked at the tall, redheaded guy beside her, she couldn't help but feel a little bit of doubt creep into her throat.

"Thank you for showing her a good time Mr. Sparks," Reeve spat out, "I am sure you'll be hearing from Kisaragi taishou soon."

_That doesn't necessarily mean it will be anything good of course..._he mentally added.

Reno shrugged easily as he pulled out a cigarette and a lighter, and gave a dismissive look as to say that he had nothing to add before they left. As much as the good-looking girl in the short shorts and thigh-high boots looked, he had to remember to keep a straight face, because it could never be.

"Hey Yuf?"

"Yes?"

"Your underpants are showing out the back of your shorts."

The young ninja said nothing as she gazed at him in an amusing mix of horror and fury at his obviously gutter-bent mind.

"You ass..."

"I like yours, from what I see. Well...see ya."

And with that Yuffie could tell that as good as he looked she HATED that cold, obnoxious redhead. Even as his lanky frame started off towards the direction of the boat dock.

_You prick..._She thought. _It's a good thing I got other plans in mind, because I'd hate to be stuck marrying a jackass like you._

Reeve would have been appalled at the language, but would have breathed a sigh of relief, just to hear these thoughts as he PHS'd a buggy back to Wutai, and ushered Yuffie away, anxiously casting glances over his shoulder, making sure that no one saw that Rude Sparks had never really been there.


	4. Too Much Thinking and Drinking

Disclaimer: The same as last time kiddies! I don't own anything!

A/N: I just want to thank everyone who reads, as well as everyone who reviews. I really appreciate it everyone! Doumo arigatou!

"Well, it's really for the best. Don't worry about it Reeve."

Those were the last words that he had expected to come out of Kisaragi taishou's mouth.

He was pleasantly surprised by the king's reaction to the fact that Yuffie had met Reno instead of Rude. Reeve had a change of heart on the buggy ride home about his approach towards the matter. Throughout the whole ordeal he had deigned to stay quiet and try to play the whole thing off as if it had gone on without a hitch. However, an unusually quiet Yuffie gave him a bit of time to reflect on the idea. He had figured that since Kisaragi taishou was pretty intent on getting Yuffie to marry Vincent Valentine, that more harm would come out of lying than just plain telling the truth. Somehow or another Kisaragi taishou would have found out the truth about what happened, and surely dishonesty was probably the greater of two evils.

"Really, sir?"

"Really! It couldn't be better! Honestly, I was afraid that she might come to like a quiet, brooding guy like Rude. It was nice that his brash, young partner came instead. Da Chao only knows that she never could get along with someone so much like herself. But, I think it's for the best that we don't let my daughter know the truth. So let's just keep this between us, alright Reeve?"

"Yes sir!"

"You are dismissed."

Reeve scampered off with a satisfied look on his face, eager to find Yuffie and find out why she had been so quiet on the way back to Wutai.

He climbed the stairs to find Yuffie lying in bed, an arm slung over her eyes as she muttered to herself angrily. She had traded worse verbal blows with the migrant bandits she fought while out materia-hunting, but there was a strangely degrading quality to the ribald comment when it came from the feisty redhead she met that afternoon. Reeve sat down gently next to her and poked her side affectionately.

"Hey, what's the matter, Princess?"

"Oooo...I'm just so mad at that Rude guy!" She bit back a smile at the irony of the comment. "I just can't believe that he had the audacity to comment on my...appearence, like that!"

"Now, now...don't let it bother you so much. It's all over, and you'll never have to see that guy again. What should be on your mind is your upcoming meeting with Vincent Valentine. From what I understand, your father hasn't set a definite meeting date, but you should start getting prepared to meet him and trying to win his affections. Don't you agree?"

"But Reeve! I'm so angry at that butthead I can hardly think about anything else! I'd liketa teach him a thing or two about how to treat a princess!"

Reeve shuddered internally at the thought of Yuffie being unable to concentrate on Vincent because of something that Reno had done. He tried once again to distract her from thinking any further about him.

"Come on, Princess! Don't waste your time on such a...douchebag!"

Yufffie laughed at Reeve's use of the word. His usually mature stature didn't match the word that came out of his mouth.

"Reeve, you crack me up sometimes, you know that?"

"I try. Now come on, let's go find something else for you to do. If you can't at least think about Vincent, we don't want you thinking about Re--ude...either."

The young ninja grinned toothily and stood up.

"Alright! Take me to the Pagoda then! Let's go get some sparring done."

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"How was it, partner?"

Rude stood behind the counter at his bar in Junon. He looked amused at the sulky Reno sitting in front of him, downing what must have been his fifth beer since getting back. From the moment he stepped in the door he had already reeked of stale liquor, but it was always a bad idea to deny Reno, if drink is what he wanted.

_As a matter of fact, it's a bad idea to deny Reno anything, really..._Rude mused to himself silently.

"Man! That girl was a cutie! I can't get over it, yo."

Rude raised a bemused eyebrow, hardly surprised at his partner's reaction.

"You shoulda seen her when we were at the dock. I looked at her and I thought to myself that there ain't no way a girl like that would ever interest me, ya know? Then she starts pukin' all over the place coz she got sick and I was definitely thinking the day was over. But we pull back into Costa del Sol, and I go grab some grub and come back to this SIZZLIN' babe dressed in short shorts and knee-high boots, all leggy and pale and I'm like, damn, I'm sold. But then I remind myself that there ain't no way I could ever get with her anyway."

"Really? That's not like you."

"Gimme a break, yo! For one thing, she's supposed to be meetin' you, not me. Secondly, if I blew my cover, the both of us woulda been in a lotta hot water with the King of Wutai. Lastly, I'm nothing but a second-rate member of the Turks...I ain't got nothing to offer a princess."

"That really doesn't sound like the Reno I know talking. You must have done something pretty bad to think that you don't have a chance with her."

The redhead allowed himself to drain his latest bottle of beer and tap the counter agitatedly.

"If I tell ya, you're gonna hafta give me some hards, on the house. Coz that's the only way I'm gonna be able to relive this moment without wantin' to bash my own head with my shock-rod."

Rude nodded as a sign of agreement.

"I knew that I had to blow it, but I just couldn't help myself. One thing I knew I was thinking about her skin, and how pale and beautiful it looked. Then the next thing I'm pullin' her up outta the sand and she falls into my arms and shoves me away. And I get bitter so I decide to blow that joint and make some smart-ass comment about her butt, and blamo...it's all over for me. Time to pack up and go home."

Rude turned around and handed Reno a tall bottle of whiskey and a shot glass as a means of condolences for the most certainly, least-smooth move...ever.  
somber silence fell over the two as Reno downed three shots in under a minute. His blue eyes glassed over and he slurred as he began to try and console himself while slowly hopping off the barstool and staggering to a room.

"Yanno...I dun need no broad anyway. And there's prolly plenny o' hotties out there that jus' wouldn't be able t'resist my charms. So fugget it."

His partner watched him fall face first into a bed as he put the bottle of whiskey back over on the display racks, throwing the shot glass in the sink, and swiping a damp cloth over the watermarks where Reno's beverages were.

"Something tells me that this is going to be a long day..." Rude muttered to himself as he clicked on the open sign that hung above the bar entrance and walked to the room to shut the door Reno had left open, hiding the sorry state of the person in it.

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It had been an hour or so since he had woken from his nap. The sunset turned the room a candy-colored orange-red, and yet he still did not rise from the bed to head down to supper. Instead, he lay there thinking about the charming young scientist he had met while he was in the army. It was only in the most sullen of his thoughts that he let the pretty-faced angel linger. She worked alongside Hojo in the biological sciences department of Shinra Inc., and was directed to care for Vincent while he was recovering from his prosthetic arm surgery. Vincent had been going through a hard part of his life at this point; finding out that his brother had been tricked and killed, along with losing his arm. He was angsty and full of rage, and for the most part, refused to be cooperative with people. At first he didn't do a thing the young woman had told him to do. She had asked him to start doing some of the rehabilitative exercises that would adjust him to his new limb. He refused. She had asked him to take the medications that would help his new arm fuse to the remains of his old one. He had told her to go to Hell. Yet there was not a day where she did not come in and sun him with a smile while gently suggesting that he do what she told him to.

This beautiful, patient girl, Lucrecia, was surprised one day as Vincent grabbed her arm as she started to leave. She was almost certain that because of his stubborn refusal to cooperate with the procedures, he would never have use or control of his arm. Contrary to her belief, the metal tips of his fingers gently caught the end of the sleeve of her lab coat, and tugged for her to turn around. She threw a startled look at the brooding young man before her. She quickly recovered and tried to hide her astonishment.

"Yes, is there something I can do for you?"

"I...I just wanted to apologize to you."

"Oh?"

"I know that I haven't exactly been the most cooperative, or pleasant patient to deal with. And I feel pretty terrible about my behavior. After all...you've only been trying to help me."

"It's really no problem Mr. Valentine --"

"Please, call me Vincent."

"Vincent. Please, let me know if there is anything I can do to make you more comfortable."

With a small smile, she turned and walked out of the room, clutching her clipboard to her chest much more tightly than usual.

Hojo caught her as she came around the corner and slipped a pale arm around her back.

"How is our patient progressing?"

"Doing quite better than expected, Sir."

"You know you don't have to address me so formally, Lucrecia. After all, you're going to bear my child!"

She half-smiled and nodded gently at the older man. Hojo proceeded to take his arm away and walk off, slightly muttering to himself.

With a bit of hesitation, she glanced back in the direction of Vincent's room, where he lay sleeping.

Of course he did not know about that last part until a couple of weeks later, when the bump had become slightly more prominent in her tiny tummy. He also happened to overhear a disturbing conversation occurring between the two scientists about an experimental procedure that Hojo had wanted his child's mother to undergo. Injecting some kind of cells in her unborn baby to try and perfect him as a human.

From this conversation now only fragments flashed in and out of Vincent's head. Quietly confronting Lucrecia about what he had overhead. Confronting Hojo about his plans. Being thrown out of the hospital. Sneaking back in after receiving a call from Lucrecia that she was about to deliver, and that Hojo was refusing to leave the lab to be by her side. A baby screaming, with a too-quiet mother sweating and barely breathing above it...

"STOP!"

He screamed to himself as he heard a door fly open.

"I'm sorry!" A pale, startled maid quickly bowed out of the room.

"No, no, I'm sorry. I was thinking of something else. Please, what is it?"

"I just wanted to inform you that dinner was ready Sire. I truly am sorry for interrupting you."

"No, don't be. I'll be down in a few minutes. I'm sorry I startled you."

"It's quite alright sire."

Wiping the sweat from his brow and straightening his cloak as he stood, he headed down for dinner, trying to keep these horrible memories from his mind.


	5. Surprise, Surprise!

Disclaimer: Same as always everyone! I still don't own anything!

Yuffie had more than had her fair share of sparring for the day. She was almost on the brink of utter exhaustion in an attempt to work out all the anger and frustration that had been sparked by "That stupid redhead". Reeve challenged her by using the latest upgraded model of his own personal stand-in; Cait Sith. He had developed the machine to be used as a means for him to travel to different places and observe people for Kisaragi taishou, without being recognized or noticed for who he really was. The little cat looked harmless perched atop a giant stuffed mog, but was a powerhouse when it came to fighting. If that wasn't enough, a few of the other Wutain elders had decided that they would love a turn against the scrappy, young Princess. This of course, she could not refuse. The sun was almost completely set when she stepped outside the Pagoda and slumped down one of the outer walls, looking pale and tired.

"Here, drink this."  
handed her a bottle of sparkly blue liquid that only served to remind her of the color of Reno's eyes. Looking at it disgustedly, she handed it back to Reeve, pulling a face.

"I can't have you fainting on me...I would never hear the end of it from your father. Now drink it."

Yuffie reluctantly took back the drink and took a tentative sip. She was pleasantly surprised by the carbonation and sweetness of the drink. Within a matter of moments of the first swallow, she started to feel her energy come back.

"Heeeeey, this is pretty good Reeve. What is it?"

"I believe it's being sold under the name "Elixir"...though I'm not quite sure what kind of elixir it's supposed to be. Everyone swears by it. It's supposedly very good at replenishing your health in a short amount of time. Don't tell me you haven't had any before, especially after all that materia-questing you do!"

"Nope! I've never had any of these before. Usually I get some Hi-Potions and take those with me...but with the all-mighty Cure Materia, who needs dinky drinks like this?"

Reeve chuckled a bit at his ward's naivety.

"You do realize that as you use materia you drain a kind of energy from your body, right?"

"Of course I know that! I AM a materia aficionado, after all."

The older man's eyebrows shot up into his hairline hearing such fancy vernacular from the princess.

"Wow, I can tell you're tired, just by the way you talk. We better get you home and quick!"

He jokingly put a hand to her forehead which was promptly smacked away with a giggle and an admonishing look.

"Hey, you! I can use those big words too ya know! I just choose notta."

Smiling affably at her, he led the way back to the Kisaragi palace, glad to hear something other than how bent she was over Reno.

Reeve and Yuffie walked in just in time to see Kisaragi taishou walking down the stairs, looking for his daughter and advisor.

"Ah, I was wondering where you two were. None of the maids could tell me; yet I supposed my precious daughter was safe with my closest advisor."

Reeve shifted uncomfortably at the compliment. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Yuffie rolling her eyes at her father's unusually affectionate address.

"So what's the deal pops? You're not usually this nice..."

"Why, I feel as though I have a very compelling reason to be nice to my beautiful daughter, who is going to do something right for a change, and do something good for her country. As well as a great deal of praise for the man who is going to help her accomplish this."

Reeve inched back considerably, stuffing two fingers in the collar of his shirt, trying to alleviate the imagined pressure he was feeling at this very moment. Yuffie was also cringing considerably, full aware of the fact that these speeches always meant nothing good was about to come her way.

"Now, now...no need to get so startled and uptight you two. I'm only talking about your upcoming meeting with Vincent Valentine; the Crown Prince of Nibelheim."

Still looking a bit apprehensively at the old man in front of him, the two waited for him to continue.

"I was so certain that my dearest here would be able to scare off Rude..." Kisaragi taishou paused as he shot a meaningful look at Reeve, "That I sent a messenger to arrange a meeting date with Prince Valentine earlier this afternoon while you two were out. He returned a little while ago with word that Vincent would be delighted to have you two over next weekend for the Nibelheim Fair."

Yuffie's jaw hung agape as Reeve posed the question that she wanted to ask, but couldn't gain enough control over herself to do it herself.

"Sir, the entire weekend?"

"Yes. The ENTIRE weekend."

The king focused a stern look at the definitely nervous pair. The materia-hunting, ninja princess was on the brink of throwing up, her stomach was fluttering so hard. Her guardian smiled awkwardly and timidly posed the next question.

"But Sir...what if things don't go...as smoothly...what with such a broad timeframe involved...?"

"Why, Reeve, that should not even be a concern. Because for the next week you are going to send Caith Sith out to scout Nibelheim, as well as train our little princess accordingly to how one might think the Crown Prince of the town would want his bride to act."

A considerable amount of sputtering and choking could be heard throughout the palace as Reeve tried to regain enough composure to swallow his saliva through his esophagus and not into his lungs, as well as the start of another Yuffie-brand tirade about how she shouldn't have to change herself in order to find a suitable husband. Before the argument could even begin, Kisaragi taishou raised a hand to silence the both of them, forgiving only the coughing spasms that Reeve was still suffering from.

"There is no discussion. You are dismissed."

The king turned his back on the shocked pair and strode back up the stairs, his hands neatly folded behind his back.

"Reeve, we are in some serious shit."

The goateed man looked at her admonishingly for the use of such language, but said nothing, due to the fact that despite the cuss word, he could not have put it better himself.

"Tomorrow I am going to deploy Caith Sith just as your father said to. Although, to tell you the truth, I have no idea how I would even begin attempting to train you to be a Nibelheimian bride...that's just not something I'm versed in."

"Don't give me that crap, Reeve." Genuinely hurt, the young ninja jutted out a pouty lower lip as she trained her eyes on the ground in front of her.

"I don't understand..."

"I'm tired of hearin' about how no one's gunna wanna marry me just because I'm a lil 'immature'...I get it okay? Maybe I ain't the best example of how a grown-up girl who's the princess of some big, fancy country is supposed to act or supposed to be...but the most important thing is that through all of those fancy titles and crap, I'm still me. Yuffie Kisaragi. Not Lady Yuffie Kisaragi of Wutai. Just plain ol' materia-hunting, bad-guy ass-kickin', answer-my-dad-back-coz-I-don't-agree-with-his-stupid-ideas, Yuffie."

Somewhere between the start and the finish of this rant, big, salty tears began to roll down her face and plop unceremoniously onto her shirt. Reeve pulled a handkerchief from his coat and used it to wipe away the wetness from her face. He let her take the hanky to blow her nose with, and stuck a paternal hand atop her head, smoothing her hair in an attempt to comfort the girl in front of him.

"Hey...it's okay. Alright? You're doing your best to be true to the ideas and feelings that you hold to be true. And don't worry so much about trying to be something or someone you don't think you are. I've been watching over you since the day you were born, and there was never a moment I thought that you didn't have the potential to be something - anything - you wanted to."

"Why can't my dad think so too? Why can't my dad see that in me like you do?"

Her sobs had died down to sniffles.

"I don't know Princess. I really don't know. But you just keep doing your best, and one of these times you're going to prove him dead wrong, and he'll have to eat his words as you show him that plain ol' Yuffie is the _best_ Yuffie, to run a country...and to have as a daughter."

The young girl appreciated what Reeve had said, and hugged him briefly before dragging herself up to her room to put an end to what had been a pretty miserable day. Her caretaker decided to go and mull over what she had told him with some warm sake, wondering if there wasn't any way to get Kisaragi taishou to try and understand his daughter just the slightest bit better. Releasing a heady sigh he gravitated towards the dining area.

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It was almost two-thirty in the morning when Rude decided to call it a night. After serving his last round of drinks and emptying out the bar, he finally flicked off the bright neon "Open" sign and started to clean up. Food was all over the place, as were watermarks, used glasses, napkins, bottles of beer, and other assorted trash. He sighed headily as he noticed the more raunchy rubbish beginning to line the further corners of the bar. After another hour of hard work invested in cleaning up the place, he checked in on Reno, who for all intents and purposes appeared to still be sleeping. Leaving the door cracked, the baldheaded Turk decided to go down to the basement to bring up more supplies for the coming day.

It must have been another forty-five minutes or so before Rude was finally done hauling crates and boxes of assorted beers and liquors, as well as replacement glasses for the ones that careless customers had destroyed, and placing them all in their respective areas. He poked his head back into the room to tell Reno that he was ready to retreat back to their headquarters for a little sleep after a hard night's work, especially with his best (and only) flair bartender having been out of commission for the night. He was surprised to see nothing more than rumpled sheets and a disheveled room.

_He's a grown man, _Rude thought to himself, _He can take care of himself. He's a Turk too. I'll just see him tomorrow or whenever he decides to come back to HQ._

Rude rearranged the bed and left the door open to air out the last whiffs of reeking alcohol that his partner had dragged in, clicked off all the lights and and made his way out of the bar, locking the door behind him.

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Reno, on the other hand, had sobered up considerably after waking up from his humiliation/liquor-enduced nap. He had taken one of the Turk motorcycles that for some reason, was conveniently parked outside the bar, and rode off just to get some fresh air and clear his thoughts of drink and the brat. He only got as far as a lightly forested area near Fort Condor, when he idled the motor and decided to walk around and look for a few monsters or muggers to take all his aggression out on. He walked for a considerable amount of yards, and had yet to run into a single living baddie, though he was surprised to see corpses of said bad guys littering the forest. The prospect of a real challenge taunted him eerily,but thrilled his blood as he continued to walk on, shock-rod at the ready. Some rustling in a nearby bush set his instincts ablaze as he readied his stance to electro-bash the crap out of whatever came out; but was soon disappointed by the scampering of a small rabbit.

"Stupid rodent...get outta my way. I'm lookin' for bigger prey than you."

Shooing the rabbit away, he let his guard down long enough for a large metal object to come flying out at him, followed by what seemed to be an awfully acrobatic chunk of meat.

He easily dodged the flying object and aimed a blow at the figure who did a sharp back-handspring away from what would have been a very painful injury. With a whir and a thud, a young girl caught her oversize shuriken in a crouched fighting stance and finally took in her newest adversary.

In a matter of seconds from initially locking eyes, two voices could be heard in the night silence, exploding with surprise and accusation in unison.

"Rude!"

"Yuffie!"

_Ohh crap._


	6. Fight To Say I'm Sorry

Disclaimer: Same as always kiddies, I still don't own a thing!

A/N: Hello hello all! Sorry about the long hiatus, but I was busy moving in to my new apartment for the school year. That's been the reason for the lack of updates so far. In addition to that, my beloved computer DIED on me, so I was without computer for a week. Emoness. Anyway, the point is that I have my baby back, and this story is on it's way back on track! Yay, rhymes. Anyway, thanks for sticking with it, and thank you for all the kind reviews! Enjoy the latest installment!

"What the Hell are you doin' out here at this time brat?"

A bit of residual bitterness at the day's events tinted the color of his voice as the first thing that came to mind seemed to just fly out of his lips.

"You jackass! Where d'you get off callin' me a brat! You're one of the most despicable people I've ever had the displeasure of having to go on one of these stupid blind dates with!"

With a loud shriek she let the shuriken fly and charged at the Turk with amazing speed and ferocity. Wanting to dodge the greater of two dangers, Reno was able to dodge the large metal object flying at him, but not the high roundhouse kick that the young ninja placed neatly on his jaw line. Letting his temper get the best of him he cast a quick fire spell and aimed it at an unsuspecting Yuffie, who was currently charging him once more. Little licks of fire came shooting out at her and caught neatly on her clothes.

"Shit!" Yuffie cursed as she quickly tossed the shuriken at Reno once more and cast a quick curative spell on herself to heal the burns that had formed from the low-level fire attack.

The shuriken grazed Reno's shoulder, opening up a quite large and painful, but not serious, gash. Switching his shock-rod to the other hand, thanking his ambidexterousity, he charged at her with reckless abandon, catching her clear in the face with the handle of his weapon. She let out an enraged shriek and hitting her limit, took up her shuriken and sent a blast of searing energy in a wave at her adversary.

Unfortunately for the tired girl, the nimble Turk managed to dodge the attack and turned up the shock capabilities on his EMR to full power. He came at her once more, and she used her shuriken as a shield - forgetting that metal is just a conductor for electricity.

Yuffie screamed as the current of electricity raced through the shuriken and into her body. She was stunned to the point where she could not let go of her weapon to break the current. Reno, who had beforehand, been in an anger-fueled rage, was snapped out of his vicious attack by the gut-wrenching screams of the girl in front of him. He quickly threw his shock-rod to the ground, breaking the electricity from Yuffie's shuriken, and watched in horror as she fell silently to the ground.

He hadn't meant for it to go this far.

Gingerly picking the metal object off of the young girl's fallen form, he braced himself for the aftershock which was sure to come as he propped her up in his arms. An unpleasant, but not unbearable, tingle rushed through him as he cradled her upper body in one arm.

"Hey...hey, girl. Wake up."

She didn't even stir, her heartbeat slow and irregular, her breath almost undetectable. His voice raised a pitch in panic as he started to lightly pat her cheeks in an attempt to wake her.

"Hey! Come one! This ain't funny kid! You know I didn't mean to...mean to...do...this..."

Reno was near hysteria as he realized that he didn't even have a cure materia on him. Frantically looking for some way to revive her, he noticed the necessary bright green orb winking up at him from the discarded shuriken. He reached in to it and winced as a lot of remaining shock flooded through his hand and up his arm. Placing the orb above Yuffie and concentrating hard, he cast the strongest curative spell he could, and waited with baited breath as the green light engulfed the girl lying in his arms.

As soon as a pair of dark brown eyes fluttered drowsily open he tossed the orb aside, smoothing short black locks away from a startled, and obviously unwell face. Her gaze flickered up to him, but didn't show a hint of recognition or recollection that he had been the one that put her in this state. Her eyes snapped shut once more, but this time her breath and heartbeat were stronger.

"Oh God, I'm so sorry. Please...open your eyes."

It was a few more seconds before her eyes popped open once more, and in a swift move she had shoved herself away from Reno and slapped him right across the face.

"I can't believe you would do that to a girl! You pig!"

Reno's eyes nearly popped out of his head as he gave her the most startled look she had ever seen in her entire life.

He wanted to throw himself at her and hold her and tell her that he was sorry and that he hadn't meant to hurt her so. He hadn't meant to be so vicious - but her presence was driving him crazy. He could barely control the things he said and did, and it scared him senseless because he had barely met her.

"Look kid, I'm real sorry I did that to ya. I didn't mean for it...I didn't mean for it to go that far. I never meant to do that. I really mean it. I didn't mean to."

Not one to hold grudges, she looked at him admonishingly, and with a hint of a grin started to try and scare him.

"Ya know, my dad's the king of Wutai. I could have your ass for this kind of thing..."

Reno swallowed hard.

"But, why doncha take me to go get a drink and we'll call it even. Dad'll never have to know about any of this. Gotta deal?"

He grinned back stiffly at the kid in front of him and got up. Offering a hand to help her up, she accepted, and he pulled her into a headlock, stealthily taking in the scent of her shampoo and sweat as he whispered softly, "Deal."

A/N P.II: Sorry! Short update just to let you guys know I'm still around! Plus, the break off makes the story better this way! Gomen ne! See you in the next chappie!


	7. Taking Wild Chances

Disclaimer: Same as always, Loves! I don't own anything!

A/N: Whew! Finally, another update! Thanks for hanging in there guys! This won't be lost to cyberspace, I swear! Now on to the feature presentation!

"Sooooo, where's the fancy helicopter, or buggy or somethin'?"

Yuffie fidgeted nervously as she realized that she saw none of these modes of transportation, but rather a dinky-looking motorcycle, black, emblazoned with the Shinra logo on it. Reno plucked a bulky helmet off the seat of the bike, tossing it at the girl. It had the logo just like the bike, but didn't look like something her companion would use, her neither for that matter.

"Leviathan!" She choked out. "What the Hell do they use this for? An emergency puke bucket or something? This reeks!"

Reno threw one long leg over the bike and looked back mischievously at the young ninja. Yuffie's heart seemed to stop for a second or two, looking at this bright-eyed, wild-haired Turk, illuminated by the moonlight and astride a motorcycle, giving her this look that at that moment was sexy as Hell. She knew it was probably unintentional that the gaze he shot her was rife with hunger and power, but it still managed to send shivers down her spine.

The look soon melted into one of apprehension and slight confusion. He looked impatiently at his watch and noticed the lateness of the hour. He couldn't believe that it was that late. There wasn't a single bar within a reasonable distance he could take her to; he didn't doubt that all the legitimate places were either open or teeming with the kind of people he wouldn't want to be around the girl. And he definitely wasn't going to take her into a speakeasy. He thought for a second about taking her on an expedition to 7th Heaven, but thought better of the distance, and his cover being blown.

"Hey kid, what are ya just standin' around for, yo? Strap on that helmet and let's get goin'. And after this I'm takin' ya straight home. If your dad finds out you were out this late he's prolly gunna flip out or something..."

"I am not wearing this crusty, smelly, puke-bucket you call a helmet."

He looked at her impatiently as she stalked over and handed the helmet over heavily to Reno. He tossed it aside with a look of annoyance, and grabbed Yuffie's hand, jerking it hard to the other side, forcing her to get on the back of the bike.

"You better hold on good, yo. I'm a master at the motorcyclin', but you're in for a Hell of a ride kid."

She blushed at the underlying meaning that could have had, and continued to blush even more as she wrapped her arms around the waist of the man in front of her. The motorcycle came roaring to life and they were off in a second, barreling down the terrain as though they were flying. Yuffie was scared and had her entire body pressed hard against Reno's back. She was nervous that perhaps he could feel her tremors as they took sharp turns, or feel how heavy she was breathing to keep from screaming as they careened over rocky patches. But mostly, she was afraid he could feel how fast her heart was beating, and it wasn't just because of his recklessness with both of their lives.

Reno was pushing it. Gunning the throttle and taking dangerous chances, just to keep his mind off the warm body pressing against him from behind. The undeniable danger kept him in check, kept him paying attention to what was most important. Maybe that was why he could barely focus on anything but her.

Even as they sped away at a breakneck pace, as they veered around obstacles so closely he could almost taste the asphalt as he barely escaped it, his only thought were the slender arms clenching at his waist, the warm breath seeping through his clothes from where she had her face buried in his back. And despite the cool air of the Planet whipping around him, he began to sweat.

It was after a sigh of relief and tense moment where the two of them savored the feeling of their bodies melded together in all innocence, Yuffie managed to pry her arms away from his middle and take a few shaky steps off the bike and on the ground. Reno left the bike as is, snatching up a ring of keys from his pocket. They were in Junon, at Rude's bar. He didn't think his partner would mind a little after-hours business, just so long as he explained himself in the morning.

Yuffie looked up at the place in astonishment. She ran up to Reno and poked him in the side, squealing excitedly as she did so.

"You never told me you owned a bar! That's so amazing! You're a total badass with your bike and your bar and everything!"

"What...?" He looked up at the sign that read "Rude's Bar & Grill" and mentally shook himself and tried to remind his subconscious that at least in her eyes, he was still Rude Sparks.

"Yeah. Sure, neat. Whatever you say babe."

The flippant answer didn't stop her as she pranced inside and sat down at a barstool, spinning in a lazy circle. Reno stepped behind the counter and pulled down two glasses.

"You hungry?"

"Not really." she lied. She didn't want him to go out of his way to make her something.

He pulled out a bag of pretzels and poured them into a little glass bowl. After taking a bunch of ice and placing it in the glasses, he grabbed a bottle of hard liquor and a couple cans of juice and set them next to the glasses and pretzels. Grabbing a bar stool and setting it on the opposite side of the bar, he sat down and began pouring the liquor, but stopped and hovered the bottle above the other glass, while Yuffie gave him an annoyed look.

"Are you even old enough to drink?"

He peered at her funny through his bangs.

"In Wutai, the legal drinking age is 18. So cut me a break and pour me some boooooooze!"

He chuckled a bit and poured her half a glass and mixed it with the juice. He drank his plain, but had a suspicion that she had never had something as strong as this. The juice was a buffer for the taste.

She sipped it and winced, but licked her teeth keenly. It burned as it went down, but left her feeling warm inside.

"So, how'd ya end up with a weird name like Rude anyway?"

"How did YOU end up with a weird name like Yuffie?"

"Touche." She said, as she gulped down the rest of the drink. Something inside of her was feeling wild and dangerous, she knew it. She grabbed the bottle and poured herself a full glass, not bothering with the fruity juice. She was about to lift it to her lips when Reno grabbed her wrist.

"Slow down, yo. This ain't like no sake or anything. Too much of that will knock ya on your ass."

"At least it's a NICE ass." Yuffie retorted as she grinned at him.

"Touche." Reno followed suit, downing the rest of his first glass.

They bantered back and forth like that for a good hour or so. Getting drunker and drunker, more daring and bold as the liquor poisoned their veins, their actions - their thoughts. It was finally as the sun was coming up, in that electric-blue time of the morning, that the unthinkable happened.

"Ey, Rude. Lookit tha'. Th' sun's 'bout t'rise. The sky's all blue, looks like that purdy blue of yer eyes." She smiled thinly as she warbled.

Reno, not nearly as drunk as she, but feeling quite loose himself, made a quick retort.

"Yeah...then, it'll turn that luscious pink color, yo. Like the color of your luscious pink lips."

They both leaned in slowly over the counter of the bar, and kissed quickly. Not having had enough, Reno jumped over the bar and grabbed Yuffie by the hair at the back of her head and pulled her into a deep, passionate kiss. He pressed her hard into himself, turning them around and backing her into the counter, working her mouth with almost a professional knowledge of the art of the kiss. It was when the sound of someone clearing their throat pointedly, that he let her go and instantly sobered up, as he saw a fuming Reeve standing in the doorway.

"I think it's time the Princess came home."

Yuffie was dozing in Reno's arms, and Reeve threatened him in a low, growling whisper as he came to take his young charge away.

"You had better watch your step, Mr. Kobayashi-Kim. Even your role as a Turk won't save you from the kind of disaster this could bring."

With that, Reeve and Yuffie left the bar, Reno standing in the shadows of the open door, against the light of the just-rising sun.


	8. Blurry

Disclaimer: As always, I own nada me Loves. Gyar! (Too much PotC, sorry!)

A/N: Thanks for all the great reviews guys! I see those and it just makes me want to hop right into the next chapter! But for the sake of quality control, I promise not to rush things, so you're going to have to bear with me. Anyway, hope you're all enjoying the fic, regardless of whether or not you review - thanks for reading! PS: Our good buddy Cid Highwind will be making an appearance this chapter, so beware the naughty language!

Reno shook his head dejectedly and smacked himself in the forehead with his palm. Shutting the door, he sank down against it, cradling his head in his knees. He had really messed up this time, and there was no turning back. There was almost no way to fix this. Reeve had caught them red-handed. And not just simply kissing. It was far more than that - it was like they were trading little pieces of their soul with one another, swapping saliva and feeling. It wasn't _just_ a kiss.

He must have fallen asleep in this position, because no sooner had he managed to let his eyes flutter open, did he notice that the door was slowly moving and scooting him across the wooden floor. He jumped up quickly drawing his shock rod from its holster, ready to strike at the intruder. A startled Rude quickly jumped into a fighting stance, and backed down just as quickly as his partner, once they recognized who the other was.

"What the Hell are you doing here?"

"I...uh...sleepin' I guess."

"You look like crap. What happened to you?"

"It's a long story."

"I've got time."

"Well...it started last night when I left the bar..."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reeve spent the entire morning looking after Yuffie. She hadn't stirred even slightly all morning. He was sure that she didn't have alcohol poisoning, but he was still worried that she was about to experience her first hangover. He wanted to make sure that the half-dead ninja wasn't going to drown in her own vomit. While he sat beside her bed, he brooded deeply, ashamed of his charge for allowing herself to be taken advantage of by that no-good redheaded Turk, angry at said Turk for trashing the girl and treating her like just another pretty face, and lastly afraid of the damage. Afraid of what all this could mean for both he and Yuffie if Godo ever found out.

The king was not oblivious to his daughter's sickness, nor was he unaware that she had stumbled in alongside Reeve at some unGodly hour. He did, however, not know that she had been out drinking herself drunk, nor that she had met up with Reno. Two things to be thankful for, no doubt. Reeve had made some quick cover story about Yuffie forgetting her Shuriken at the Pagoda and probably having gone back there to get it, only to wind up passing out outside and catching a small cold. He told Kisaragi taishou that she should be better very soon, and he bought it without hesitation.

While still muttering his fears into his hands, he noticed the young girl in front of him stirring. She cracked one groggy eye and peered into Reeve's face. He looked at her grimly, stern as he had ever been.

She felt groggy and nauseated, and could remember only little snatches of the night before. Honestly, she could hardly remember a thing. She remembered going into the woods outside of Junon to take out her frustrations over...something...and having done so...but the rest of the night was a blur.

"Reeve...what happened to me? I feel like crap..."

"You know damn well what you did young woman."

The little ninja bolted upright in bed and stared hard at the man in front of her.

"Reeve! You've never spoken to me like that before! What did I do? I don't remember okay!"

Reeve looked at her, slightly disbelieving and a bit puzzled, but with a slight sense of relief beginning to creep up into his throat.

"Don't you remember anything from last night at all?"

"I remember running off to Junon area forest, if that -- Is that what this is about? Me running off and not tellin' ya? Look, I'm real sorry, it's just that I was all frustrated again about what pops said and I wasn't thinkin' straight. Honest."

Reeve countenance changed to one of dawning comprehension as he truly began to believe that aside from what she had just recalled for him, she couldn't remember a thing.

"That's all you remember? You really don't remember anything else?"

"Not a thing Reeve. Why? Did I do something REALLY bad last night that I just ain't rememberin' too well?"

"No!" He quickly recovered this golden opportunity. "Not at all. I'm sorry for being so harsh with you Yuffie...it's...it's just that I was so frightened when you weren't here this morning that I didn't know what to do! I was so relieved just to find you knocked out in the forest that, I guess I lost my temper just now, thinking about how much worse it could have been." Reeve smiled wanly as he lied through his teeth. "Forgive me?"

"I guesso...but only of you'll give me one of those elixir things. Think it helps with nausea?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"You WHAT!"

"I kissed her, yo. I kissed her like I was dyin' and her mouth had the Elixir of Life in it or somethin' man."

"And Reeve caught you!"

"Yeah..."

"Holy shit, Reno, we could be totally f..."

"Don't. I know, okay? I know."

Rude looked at Reno like a man condemned to death. Which is what they might both be if Reeve wasn't a good buddy and managed to somehow keep the kid quiet about this.

"Why'd you do it? Huh, buddy? Why'd you do something stupid like that? I know you were bent on the girl, and I know I told you to go for it...but getting her drunk and letting yourself be open to getting noticed? That was just a bad move, my friend."

Reno's head was reeling.

"Yeah yeah yeah, whatever. I know I know I know I KNOW! You think I ain't been asking myself the same damn thing all Goddamned morning! Trying to figure out what the Hell is wrong with me? Doin' crazy stuff that could mean the end of my life as a Turk? Hell, maybe even life as I know it altogether, yo! If I wanted a lecture about my stupidity I woulda just talked to myself, okay? Now are you gunna try to help me or not?"

"She still thinks you're me, partner. It's not just your ass on the line. Mine is too. But...even if it weren't; you're like a brother to me. I'm going to help you through this, but you have to promise me you won't let anything stupid like this happen again, okay?"

"Deal." Reno said this in a voice barely above a whisper as he tried to choke back the tears that were beginning to form. The first woman he had ever thought to love, and it was never going to happen. For once he was not grateful for just simply being alive.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The next week passed without much incident, Cait Sith was deployed to Nibelheim to learn about the area and sent back daily reports about what he had learned. Nibelheim was no longer a tiny spit of a town nestled against the bosom of Mount Nibel, but was now expanded to reach farther out towards the river than it used to. There were shops galore offering the newest technology in weapons, armor, materia, items, and just about anything else you could hope for. The restaurants boasted foods from all countries, all extremely good, and most extremely expensive. This was a regal country now, one built on decadence and wealth from the prosperous reign of the Valentine family. Thus far, their heir had not let their people down.

Cait Sith had not been able to gather very much about the ways of the Nibelheim wife because the whole country was a melting pot of people from all different areas in the world. There was no shortage of displaced Wutain's who undoubtedly migrated to different countries to try and live above the rural kind of life that Wutai offered. Many of them were successful, but it seemed the best off were placed in Nibelheim as weapon makers and teahouse owners.

Kisaragi taishou had made all the proper arrangements and kept continued correspondence with Vincent about his daughter's trip to their country. Things were looking to be fun, as the Nibelheim Fair seemed to be quite the extravaganza. Of course everyone from every country and every walk of life had at some point heard about this fair. Even when it was in it's baby stages, when people thought that it would flop. But over the years and as the country prospered, it became a big, glamorous affair with an entire weekend of top-notch vendors, parties, concerts, entertainers, plays and performances of all types and from all countries. Many attended the event, few were wealthy enough to enjoy the splendor of each and every offering the fair had. But all who went had good times and took back high opinions of the nation, which of course didn't hurt them in the least.

Friday morning rolled around, and Reeve and Yuffie were all packed and ready for the journey to Nibelheim. Although they could definitely have afforded to rent out a plane of their own, they decided to hitch a ride with many members of the world's aristocracy. Cloud and Tifa Strife, Zack and Aeris Adams and Nanaki, amongst others, would all be aboard the airship Shera, piloted by infamous Captain Cid Highwind, and his longtime companion (whom the aircraft was named after) Shera.

Yuffie was not expected to dress in a kimono for a change, and was instead arrayed in a light summer dress, white and light pink, emblazoned with delicately embroidered cherry blossoms throughout. She had her hair pinned in front with cute pink clips that were adorned with crystal cherry blossoms to match the theme. She looked altogether stunning in an innocent way, and did not balk over having to wear a dress whatsoever. She was strangely subdued about the whole thing, and even gasped a little as she took in her reflection that morning, surprised that even she could mimic a lady, and anxious to see if this would please "Vinnie" as she so affectionately called him.

By eleven the airship had landed and the travel items had been loaded on. Reeve had received a stern talk from Godo about keeping his daughter in check, making sure that she made the best impression possible, and most of all, getting Vincent Valentine to seriously consider all the reasons why a union between the two would be the most advantageous arrangement he could hope for, worldwide. Godo then proceeded to give Yuffie the closest thing he could to a pep talk, and in a move totally out of character for the old man, pecked his daughter affectionately on the forehead and wished her luck.

As they ambled out into the morning sun and boarded the airship, the Captain's voice came booming over the intercom.

"Welcome to my new airship; Shera. Don't fuckin' touch anything and have a great fuckin' flight!"

Reeve and Yuffie exchanged surprised glances as they stepped on to the ship.

A/N: Oooo, you know what that means kiddies,...don't think the Reno thing is quite over yet though...See you next chapter!


	9. First Meeting

Disclaimer: As always, I own nothing!

A/N: Hey guys! This is the long awaited chapter! Thanks to all those who read and review. And a special thanks goes out to Chaotic Rei for her diligent reviewing! Thanks all!

About halfway to Nibelheim, Yuffie was sincerely regretting her decision to take the ride on the big airship with the others. Reeve was there to hold her hair back as she threw up violently into the toilet of the bathroom in the room they had given her. Cloud Strife had stopped by and offered her some medicine a little over ten minutes ago, but it had not yet kicked in. The famous blonde was sympathetic to the ninja's weak stomach in the face of motion. Eventually the vomiting subsided, but still feeling sick and quite sorry for herself, she began to cry quietly. She had soiled her dress and she looked like a wreck. Reeve patted her back consolingly.

"Why don't you go and take a shower? Get all cleaned up, and I promise when you come out I will have chosen a new outfit for you that will make you even more stunning than this plain old dress. How does that sound?"

She peered back at him through puffy eyelids and messy hair and nodded her agreement.

Less than half an hour later she was out of the shower and beautifully arrayed in an even more flattering outfit than before. Reeve had chosen a soft, black tank top with butterflies on the hem, with a black silk skirt that went down to her knees and featured similar butterflies scattered on the bottom edges. He fixed her makeup to make her just as enchanting as before, and reclipped her hair with the same pins to give it a more glamorous look. She looked at herself in the mirror and turned around and hugged Reeve tightly. She could always count on him to do his best for her.

"Reeve...thank you so much. No matter how much I goof off or do wrong, you're always there to make it better. How can I ever repay you?"

Reeve smiled and patted the girl kindly on the head.

"Bag this Vincent guy and make us all proud. I know you can."

She smiled back warmly and nodded.

"We'll be landing in Nibelheim in five minutes, so everyone get their asses ready to get off my damn ship!" Cid's voice boomed over the intercom.

Yuffie took one deep breath in, looked at Reeve and nodded, determined to do whatever she could, because opportunities like this never happened.

When she stepped off the airship, she heard herself gasp. The town was enormous and decorated beautifully in crimson and raven banners, the nation's colors. There was loud, robust music and people everywhere. Dancers were putting on impromptu performances in the middle of the street, and vendors called their wares in loud voices. She smiled broadly as Reeve walked up beside her, having seen Nibelheim before, but still relishing the glory of this affair.

Yuffie was so busy looking this way and that at the sights to be seen that she did not see a tall, darkly-clad man step to her other side.

"Wonderful, isn't it? You're smiling quite beautifully, Yuffie."

She shivered and turned slowly to the man at her right, still holding the smile, though now rather stiffly.

"I'm quite pleased to meet your acquaintance Princess Kisaragi. Your father has spoken quite highly of your virtues."

Catching her hand in his, he raised it to his lips and kissed it gently.

"Allow me to properly introduce myself, I'm Crown Prince Vincent Valentine, leader of Nibelheim. You'll be staying with me for the weekend."

The girl still looked at him smiling, but not saying a word. He was starting to feel a bit uncomfortable, as if he had unwittingly done something to affront the girl to silence.

"Please forgive the princess," Reeve interjected, "She's been quite excited about coming here to meet you, and this scene, along with your regal presence must be quite overwhelming for her, Your Highness."

"Please, call me Vincent, Mr. Tuesti."

"Reeve would be quite sufficient as well, Vincent."

"Wow, Vinnie Valentine..." Yuffie finally managed to breathe a few words.

looked at her curiously, with a hint of amusement in his stare. She didn't catch her error at first, but turned a deep shade of crimson upon realizing that she had just addressed him using her pet name for him.

"I'm so, so sorry Crown Prince Valentine. I didn't mean to address you so informally. Sorry, sorry!"

He laughed, and it was rich with a smooth resonance to it.

"Now, Princess Kisaragi, no need to get so embarrassed. Vinnie is fine, if you so desire it. Though I would much rather you use Vincent, either is fine."

"Yes Prince...uuh...Vincent." She stammered, covering her face with her hands, more than thoroughly embarrassed.

Still chuckling a bit, he managed to restrain himself back into more of a serious demeanor.

"How rude of me to keep you both waiting here, listening to my idle banter. Forgive me, I am not being a very good host. Right over there is my buggy, I'll be escorting you back to the mansion where you will be staying with me for the weekend."

They both followed him over to an expensive-looking vehicle, which he got in to drive. Both of them thought that this was a little strange for royalty, but every sovereign had their idiosynchrases. It was a quiet ride back to the manor, as Vincent's demeanor had taken on a more taciturn air. He himself was feeling a little overwhelmed at his own boldness upon meeting the young princess. He was not used to laughing so openly, or being so lax about his title or anything of the sort. But there was something unnerving about the tiny girl in the dark outfit and pretty crystal clips in her hair. She held herself like a woman, but in her eyes shone the dignity and innocence of a child. It was something that he had not anticipated, and it opened him and frightened him.

Tightening his grip on the steering wheel, he drove the buggy expertly back to his less-than humble abode, cozily placed in the original Nibelheim.


	10. Fire and Ice

Disclaimer: Same as always!!

A/N: Nope, still not dead yet. Just been kinda busy with school and all kinds of drama drama drama, but here is the next chapter and I thank you all for your patience!

The ride back to the mansion was very quiet. Vincent's former warm demeanor had frozen quite quickly and left Yuffie to shooting Reeve worried glances, no doubt searching for a sign of whether he knew if she had done something to affront the prince already. Reeve looked slightly troubled, but hid it well under a flat mask of being subtly pleased. The Crown Prince himself cast many glances in the rear view mirror at his passengers, Yuffie in particular. He caught many of her apprehensive glances, and his demeanor began to soften as her looks slowly melted down to that of a kicked puppy.

Softly clearing his throat, he spoke the first words to be uttered since the beginning of this terribly awkward ride.

"So, Princess Kisaragi, what is your first impression of Nibelheim?"

Yuffie's expression suddenly brightened, and she looked alive as she eagerly replied.

"I really like it here! It's so big and busy full of excitement! Not at all like boring ol' Wutai!"

At this remark Reeve nudged her sharply in the ribs. Vincent couldn't keep himself from laughing.

"Is that so? What is it that makes Wutai so boring?"

Reeve pulled a handkerchief from his coat and wiped at his brow. This line of interrogation was a dangerous one for the young princess to be footing, especially because she had a tendency to say what she felt and not what she should. He almost wanted to interject on her behalf, but knew it would be rude to do so. He was, however, hoping very much that Yuffie would remember that not only was the goal to make herself desirable to the prince, but her country as well. Most of the important things in these political relationships did not really rely on matters of the heart or questions of attraction to the person in front of them, but rather of the creeds and the country behind them.

"Well...maybe it's not that Wutai is boring I guess...maybe it's more coz I don't feel like I really fit in."

"Hmm?"

"I mean, all the girls there are really pretty and quiet and know how to do a lotta ladylike stuff and me...well, I'm not exactly - entirely like that."

"Well, for what it's worth Princess, I think you're quite beautiful."

He took a glance back in the mirror and watched as her face flushed crimson, but stretched in a giddy, secret smile, that he was sure he was not meant to have known.

"Looks like we've arrived!"

The vehicle pulled up into a winding driveway in front of a magnificent mansion. It was sturdily constructed and had beautiful awnings bearing the nation's colors and seal upon them. There were large, beautiful windows peeking out from all floors of the abode, and it even sported a large and lovely stained-glass crest emblazoned at the topmost reaches of the main arch of the house.

"This is where you'll be staying the weekend with me. I apologize that things may not be as tidy as one might expect from royalty, however, it is a rather large dwelling, and I do not believe in hiring excessive amounts of people to keep my house clean for me. Please excuse whatever unpleasantness you may run into."

Vincent pulled the buggy up to the front of the house and turned off the engine. He then proceeded to step out and open the door for Yuffie, as Reeve was letting himself out. It was then that a few servants slowly began to trickle out in order to help with the carrying of luggage and welcoming back the master. He gave them quick and concise orders on what to do with their things. He then turned back to his two guests.

"Reeve, if you could please afford me a moment alone with the Princess, I would appreciate it greatly. I mean no offense by the gesture, but I would like some un-chaperoned time to speak with her, if you don't mind."

"No offense taken whatsoever Your Highness."

"Janice, please show Mr. Tuesti to the tea room. I will join him shortly, with Princess Kisaragi. Have refreshments and the like ready."

The young maid did not say a word, but bowed in reply and gave Reeve a small curtsy as a sign of respect and that he should follow her.

"Come."

The young prince led Yuffie over to the side of the house where there was a large and quite beautiful rose garden, filled with a plethora of roses, all in different colors. The scent of the blossoms ran thick through the air, as did the light buzzing of the bees that fed on the nectar of the flowers. There were also many butterflies skimming through the air, taking breaks among the blooms. Taking her over to a bench surrounded by neatly trimmed bushes overflowing with crimson roses, the Nibelheim Bloom, he sat down, motioning to her that she should do the same. She sat with him, though she kept a polite distance, and glanced at him from the corner of her eye. He did not look at her for a while, but as she started to fidget, he turned his head and felt his breath catch in his throat.

Her fidgeting had disturbed the butterflies, which loved to feast upon these flowers, and they sprang up all around her. The sunlight caught her features in just the right way and her figure was illuminated in such a way that she looked positively angelic. The sight of her like that made it only easier to feel the guilt that he was for being so hot and cold with her over the course of just a few hours.

"I just wanted to take you aside and apologize for what might be interpreted as strange behavior. As you might know, I am not accustomed to having many guests with...with these particular intentions in mind. Therefore, if I have done anything that might have been misconstrued as harsh or standoffish, please accept my apologies."

"It's really no problem, Crown Prince Valentine..."

"No, please, call me Vincent."

"Prince Vincent. Please let me know if there's anything I can do to--"

'_...make you more comfortable"_

"--make things less awkward for you."

'_...address me so formally... my child!..'_

_No...no, no, no, no, no!!_

His expression had remained blank. He suddenly got up and stormed off in the direction of the front entrance.

Yuffie looked quite crestfallen as she started after him, but stopped and looked more than a little lost and helpless in the middle of the garden.

"It's a good thing I'm a ninja princess...and not some helpless little nance..." she muttered to herself, "Otherwise I'd be totally lost tryin' to make my way back to the front of the house. Jeez...what is up with this guy?!"

As she picked her way through the garden and back to the entrance, she saw him standing there under the arch of ivy and decorative ferns that hailed the opening of the garden. She was about to stalk past him frigidly, when he grabbed her arm and looped it through his. He smoothed her tousled hair and looked at her much warmly than he had all afternoon.

"Smile Princess...we wouldn't want to alarm Reeve."

With a pleasant air about him, and a smile to boot, he escorted the confused young princess back toward the mansion and into the tearoom where Reeve was waiting for them.


	11. Reaching A Point of Understanding

Disclaimer: Same as last time!

A/N: Making up for lost time!

Princess Kisaragi kept a brave face all throughout their tea time, despite her confusion and embitterment towards the quiet man before her. He and Reeve were bantering about boring politics that just did not interest her, and she let her mind wander.

She had been through a lot of these kinds of dates. Awkward attempts to jumping right into what was supposed to be the pinnacle of a 'normal' relationship. The kind of warm, slow relationship whose privilege seemed reserved only for commoners. And even though she was right here, in the home of the man of her dreams...even as he sat across her and chatted brightly with Reeve about things she didn't understand...she felt confusion and pangs of loneliness. This was all so strange. Coming to a country and staying in the house of a prince. Viewing a festival through guided eyes; eyes that were supposed to be set on the throne - the union.

Maybe that's what she liked about Rude. Or rather, the man she thought he was. There was no useless talk of politics and the states of their nations. He didn't make her feel like there was a need for him to impress her, or vice versa. She couldn't place exactly why she felt the way she did; but deep down she also felt as though he wanted her. She felt like he wanted her deeply and wholeheartedly. Not just because she was a princess, but because he was attracted to her and wanted her for himself. Yuffie silently wished she could understand why she felt so deeply that he had proven he wanted her, even though all she could remember was that one date...

"...Don't you agree Princess?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Crown Prince Valentine was just saying how tomorrow would be a lovely day to take you around Nibelheim and give you the grand tour."

"Oh!! Of course! That'd be awesome!...Er...I mean, that would be wonderful, Your Highness."

She bowed her head and focused rather intently on the pretty napkin in her lap, picking at the stitching awkwardly.

"Well then, it's settled. I would have liked to personally show you the grand tour of the mansion, but unfortunately I have a few other affairs that I must attend to. Tonight I am to deliver the NIbelheim Fair opening speech for the festivities. I am sorry that I will not be able to attend to you myself. However, if you do find yourself in need of anything, please let Janice or any of the other servants know, and they will be sure to assist you."

"Will you be joining us for dinner tonight, Sir?"

"I'm afraid not, but whatever your heart desires, it most certainly can be made or gotten here. I do hope you will both attend the opening ceremony tonight...?"

"Of course! We wouldn't miss it for the world!"

"Thank you, Reeve. Now, if you would please excuse me, I must start preparing. Janice, please take good care of our guests."

"Yes, Sire."

Vincent rose from his chair and exited the room in a few long, steady strides.

"What's wrong Princess? Something seems to be bothering you."

"It's nothing...I'm prolly just still feelin' a lil sick from the flight..."

"Did something happen between you two when you went to talk? Did he do something...untoward?"

"No...it's fine. We can talk about it later. Miss Janice? Can you show us to our rooms please?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Vincent sat in his workroom admonishing himself. He couldn't believe that he had been so cold to her again, just as he was trying to apologize for being that way. But something inside of him just couldn't help it. As she started to speak those lines, when she looked at him that way, she reminded him of what he could never have. Yet when he saw her, when he addressed her, when he spoke to her in ways that didn't slight her or didn't make her feel bad, it was plain to see how much different she was from...that other woman. He had to remind himself that this was all the more reason that he should treat her differently than he had Lucrecia. Had he just dared to think that name? Yes, it was time to move on. He had to remember, this time there was no child. There was no other man competing for the woman's affections. There was no reason he had to tuck his passions away, nor overwhelm her with them either. It was all about moderation. If only he could put this in practice it would have been so much easier. Thinking only a few minutes further on the subject, he turned his attention towards his speech. He could make a fool of himself in front of a woman, but not an entire nation and its guests.

In the meantime, Yuffie and Reeve had retired to a spacious double room that they were to share. The Crown Prince had originally placed them in separate rooms, but Yuffie asked if that couldn't be changed because she would feel much safer with her advisor around. It didn't seem to warrant any kind of worry and so was carried out. With their things all stored properly for their weekend stay, Yuffie collapsed on the bed and buried her face in the linens, not caring about her makeup or what Reeve would think. She was clearly distressed and just didn't care much at all about anything.

"Yuffie, what's wrong? You've been acting strange ever since we got here. Did Vincent try something on you while you were alone? If that's the case we can leave right now..."

"No...Reeve. That's not it at all. I just...I just don't understand him. One minute he's apologizing for being so cold to me, and the next he's in his own little world, stalking off without me and making me feel like shit. Then he grabs my arm and tells me to smile as we walk in. What's all that s'posed to mean, huh? I just don't get it. I mean, even Rude may not have been the warmest guy in the world, but at least he didn't make any false pretenses of pretending to like me either."

She sighed and ducked her face back down into the bed. She didn't feel like being here anymore. What she felt like was going back to Wutai and forgetting this whole mess.

"I know it's hard...and I know he has a tendency to act a bit...eccentric at times. But have you ever heard about his family history? Have you ever heard why he ascended to the throne, or the circumstances surrounding his life?"

The young ninja shook her head.

"Not everyone is allowed to stay in their home country and have the freedom to do as they please. Vincent's mother and father were murdered. His older brother, who was supposed to take the throne, went insane and betrayed his own heritage. Vincent himself was sent off to war and lost an arm there, which I am sure you've noticed. He's only twenty-seven Yuffie. Twenty-seven. Just think about having all those atrocities befall you and your family in such a short span of time. At such a young age. Can you imagine how hard all of that has been on him? Can you imagine the pressure?"

"No...I can't. Wow...Reeve...I never knew that all these things had happened to him..."

"The world is cold and cruel, Princess. It has left him bereft of everything but his title and his status. I can imagine he's had to become desensitized to a lot of things because of this. And maybe this is the first time he's had to try to interact with someone on such a personal level. Perhaps this is quite hard on him. So although I know it hurts to be treated so warmly one moment, and then be shafted the next, try to understand what he must be feeling, and how he's had to live life might be affecting the way he behaves around others."

With a little insight into Vincent's history, she think she could forgive him for making her feel so bad, despite her best efforts to try and win him over.

"You really think that it's just coz of those things? Not coz of something I did to make him upset?"

"I'm sure of it. I can't think of a single thing that you've done wrong today. Which is a miracle!"

Reeve laughed as a pillow hit him square in the face. He tossed it back on the bed and sat at the desk, taking a look at the itinerary for the fair.

"The opening ceremony starts at seven tonight. Why don't you get a little rest? I'll wake you up in time to get you presentable again, eat dinner and head over to the town square, okay?"

"Okay..."

Crawling under the covers, within minutes, she was snoring. Reeve chuckled quietly to himself and wondered what in the world was going to become of four simple days in Nibelheim.


	12. Strange Developments

Disclaimer: Same as usual...

A/N: Sankoo everyone for all the encouragement!

Reno was in a sorry state.

His partner had tried numerous times to cheer his friend up, which if one could imagine, was no mean feat. Not only was it rare that Reno was ever so demure, but even rarer still that Rude broke character and tried to be more uptempo rather than taciturn. The redhead appreciated his partner's attempts, and knew how much of a stretch it was for Rude to behave in such a manner, but he just wasn't having it. Even at his side job of flair bartending at Rude's bar he was unable to take his mind off of what was so heavily weighing it down. No matter how sultry the siren that came on to him, he poured the drinks, but otherwise ignored them. It was getting bad for business having one of the main attractions in such a foul mood.

After work, while Rude was starting up his nightly duties of tidying up the place, and as Reno sat perched atop a barstool inattentively munching pretzels, the tall, baldheaded man decided to broach the delicate subject of his partner's attitude.

"Hey, Reno."

"...What."

"You know, you've been in a really bad mood lately. It's not good for business. You know that your bartending and personality are what bring a lot of customers in. What's gotten into you man?"

"You know damn well what my problem is. I know that for a fact. So why don't you just stop beatin' around the damn bush and just tell me whatever it is you want to say."

Rude was taken aback by the nature of the answer, and the bluntness of the address, but he hid it well by focusing on wiping down tables.

"Well, since we're in the mood of being blunt and all, I just thought we should take a little vacation. You're in a really bad rut, and we need to do something to get the old Reno back...because to tell you the truth; this version sucks."

"Yeah, bite me. What didja have in mind?"

"The Nibelheim Fair."

"What the Hell is that?"

"It's this big extravaganza that the royal family of Nibelheim throws every year to show off how well they're doing. At the very least it would be interesting to see. Might even find you someone else who catches your attention."

"...They say the best way to get over a girl is to get under a new one, eh? I usedta believe in that, but man, I don't know anymore."

"Just give it a shot. There's no harm in trying..."

"Whaddabout the bar?"

"We'll just close it for a couple days. It's not like we need the revenue right now."

"I suppose you're right. But what if this don't work?"

"Well, then I suppose my last resort is to try to beat some sense into you."

"...ha...hahahahaha. Whatever. Welp, let's get all packed and shit tonight and head on out tomorrow. Take the 'coptor?"

"Of course."

"Alright. Well, I'll meet you back at HQ, I'm gunna go out for a walk, or something."

"...Be safe, partner."

Reno made a vague hand gesture of acknowledgment to Rude as he exited the bar. The other man sighed and continued wiping tables hoping that this fair was just the thing he needed. He didn't know how much longer he could stand Reno in Scratchy, Wet Blanket mode.

As Reno stepped outside he lit up a cigarette and got on top of the Shinra motorcycle he had used to take Yuffie on that joyride. It was only a day or so ago, but it felt like it had been Goddamned forever. If it wasn't bad enough that he had gone through that first day fearing that her old man had found out and was sending out assassins to bring back his head on a platter that very day, he was too busy brooding over something he couldn't have - and not being able to have something is just a thing that Reno wasn't used to.

_I'm a friggan Turk! I should be allowed to have anything I want! Hell, I don't even needta be a Turk for that. I even told my own parents to get off my case when...well...that's not really important. I didn't need nobody's permission to get my tattoos. I d__idn't need nobody's permission to become a Turk. I want, I get. But this is different. She isn't a thing...she's a living, breathing, person. I wonder if it's her choice that she don't want me, or is it just what her father'd say...I bet that old geezer'd __eat his katana if he found out I came anywhere near his precious little girl. Man...sometimes life blows..._

With an expert flick the cigarette butt went flying through the air and onto the pavement. Reno started the bike with a roar and rode off in the direction of the Turk's HQ where he and Rude were stationed at the moment, to get his stuff together for a trip to Nibelheim.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Yuffie was exhausted. The opening ceremony was interesting, with pretty fireworks and good performances from some of the fair's highlight entertainers, even Vinnie's speech was well-written and eloquently executed, but she could hardly keep her eyes open by the end of the night. Reeve had practically half-carried the girl back to the buggy after the ceremony had come to a close. Vincent, of course, had PR affairs to deal with, and was unable to accompany them back. All the same, the young princess was much too tired to care.

When they reached the mansion, she flopped down on the bed and was asleep almost instantly. Reeve chuckled to himself and stayed up a bit longer to do some paperwork that he had brought with him. It was about an hour later, just as Reeve was about to get ready for bed, that there was a quiet knock on the door. He answered it, only to find the Crown Prince himself, standing before him.

"Yes, Sir? Is there something I can do for you?"

"I just wanted to say goodnight to the Princess, if she was still awake that is."

"I'm sorry, she fell asleep as soon as we got back. She was very tired. It's been quite an overwhelming experience for her!"

Vincent broke a small grin. He couldn't help but be glad that at least she was having fun here, despite the way he had been acting towards her.

"That's quite alright. I wasn't really expecting her to be awake still. I'll see you and the Princess at breakfast in the morning then. Goodnight Reeve."

"Goodnight, Sire."

Quietly closing the door, Reeve tucked his papers away and readied for sleep, crawling into the other bed in the room and falling asleep, shortly thereafter.

In the morning, Reeve was up again, bright and early, setting out Yuffie's attire for the day. Sometimes he wondered if it agitated the young Princess to have everything so set out for her, but decided that at least for the time being, it was better this way. He woke his charge up about an hour and a half before breakfast was to commence. She was groggy, and slightly grumpy, but after showering and dressing, she was in a much better mood. There was even time to spare for her and Reeve to talk a bit more than they had yesterday. Not only reflectively, but strategically as well. He versed her in the things she might want to say, and let her talk a bit about how she was feeling towards things so far. The response was mostly positive, if not for the few kinks that Vincent's standoffish attitude were producing so far.

He didn't want Yuffie to brood too much on that point, and so before they went down to breakfast, he told her a little something to boost her spirits.

"Vincent...he came by to see you last night after he got back from the festivities."

"Did he?!"

"Yes. He said he wanted to say goodnight if you were still awake, but you were sleeping, so he told me to give you his regards."

_So...that was a little bit of an...exaggeration...no harm, no foul..._

"Wow, that's so cool of him! I really think he's comin' around!"

"You bet. Okay, now remember, game face. Okay?"

"You got it!"

Arm in arm, the pair went down to breakfast.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Rude and Reno had arrived in Nibelheim not too long after the royal breakfast commenced. It was roughly ten in the morning when their copter landed just on the outskirts of Nibelheim. With the Shinra logo boldly emblazoned on it, they held no fear that someone would try to steal it. Upon entering the town, they were impressed by how much of a big deal this dinky little fair turned out to be.

"'Ey Rude, you remember when Nibelheim usedta be just some crappy little town all buried in the mountains?"

"Yeah. Isn't it amazing how far they've come?"

"Yeah, sure. Whatever. I hear that infamous psychopath Seth Valentine was from here."

"...I'd be careful where you speak those words in this town, partner. That's the deceased brother of the current Crown Prince."

"Whoop dee friggan doo, yo. We're Turks. The only thing we gotta worry about is havin' some fun here."

Rude grinned slightly, Reno was beginning to sound like his old self again.

"So, where we stayin'?"

"I didn't want to be stuck in the center of all the events, so I booked us a room at an inn in Old Nibelheim, closer to the mountains and residential zone."

"Sounds good t'me. Let's head on over there and drop off our stuff. Then we can come back and take a look around...see what they got to offer us on our lil' vacation."

With that, they both hauled their bags over to the inn at Old Nibelheim Town Square.

After about twenty minutes of just walking to the inn, checking in and dropping off their stuff, both Reno and Rude were ready to go look for something to do. Reno was more than ready to hit the bar, despite it only being ten-thirty in the morning, but Rude managed to convince him to at least do a little more walking around and sightseeing before he started getting drunk. The redhead sulkily agreed, and allowed his tall friend to lead him around looking at this and that.

Many whispers followed them as they passed by the common folk, people easily recognizing the standard-issue suits they wore, as well as just the faces. There were few people who didn't know of the pair, as their reputation in the Turks propelled them to almost celebrity status. Reno sighed. Wasn't there enough to gawk at without them all staring at him and Rude?

Rude was surprised to see how many different people were there. There were rough, city kids from Midgar, all the way down to Kimono-clad Wutains, who served only to remind him of why he had taken them here. A short, gaudily-clad man whose name-tag read "Don Corneo" was sitting at a booth lined with beautiful women, offering tours of Nibelheim for a fee. Rude told Reno to wait nearby, making a weak excuse of wanting to check something out. Reno just nodded nonchalantly and headed over to a takoyaki stand run by an old Wutain lady and her husband. They bantered kindly with him, and sold him a cup of takoyaki drenched in the delicious mayo sauce that was characteristic. He ate it in a bored fashion, wondering what the Hell his partner was doing that was taking so damn long. After polishing off the cup of takoyaki, and a small glass of soju to boot, he finally saw Rude walking back with two good-looking girls following him.

Rude grinned a bit as he spoke to the one on his right and gave her a gentle push towards Reno. The bold brunette needed no goading as soon as she set sights on Reno. Walking up to him slowly and seductively, she extended a hand tipped in long, pink acrylic nails.

"Why hello, Reno-san. My name is Kiyoko, and I'll be your _tour guide_ today..."

Her long brown hair was held back by a bejeweled clip, and she wore sparkling jewels around her throat, wrists, and on her fingers and earlobes. Her considerable bust swelled beneath a tightly laced corset-dress that mimicked the look of a cheongsam. The skirt was cut short, revealing a pair of wonderfully-shaped pale legs. She looked at him expectantly, almost with a touch of impatience.

Grabbing her hand and raising it to his lips, he grinned wolfishly first at Rude, who gave him a knowing nod from behind the girl, where he stood with his own escort, and next at the voluptuous vixen in front of him.

He didn't say a word, but saw the passion flare up in her eyes excitedly, as those baby blues conveyed a message words would have made vulgar.

They were going to have some fun today.


	13. What's Wrong With You?

Disclaimer: Same as always! I still don't own a thing!

A/N: Sorry for the long hiatus. I'm taking three lit courses this semester and the books are drowning me. Yep, didn't know paper could do that didja? Anyway, sorry for the delay and hope you enjoy the next chapter of...this.

: BAD LANGUAGE APLENTY. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED

The blatant disappointment flared up wonderfully in Reno's temperament. Although he had spent the whole morning with his eyes practically buried in Kiyoko's ample cleavage, Rude had misjudged, and these beauties that they spent towing around were really just tour guides. On the other hand, what was to say that Rude should have thought that they were...something other than tour guides anyway? Sure they dressed a little...risque, and exposed their Goddess-like figures without even a hint of shame, but still...

As Kiyoko and Mae (or so he thought he heard the other girl introduce herself as) led them up to the main attraction, The Nibelheim Mansion; Home of the Royal Valentine Family, Reno was aching to either get some play or get away from these girls. He wasn't in a mood to be teased by some half-naked succubi all day.

"This, everyone, is the world-famous Nibelheim Mansion! Home of The Royal Valentine Family--"

"Look, lady. We ain't stupid, we know were we are. Now enough with the chitchat, yo. There's a lil something I want to tell _you_," Grabbing the girl and pressing her hard into his body he practically growled, "The word of the day is 'legs', babe, so why don't we go back to my hotel room and spread the word?"

At the same moment that this was occurring, the Crown Prince, as well as Reeve and Yuffie were just stepping outside the door. From far away they could see four figures standing by the mansion gate, two of them seemed to be making out from their vantage point. Yuffie thought there was something familiar about the one with the bright orange hair...she couldn't place it but, she could have sworn she knew them.

Reeve, knowing that shock of orange hair the moment he spotted it, quickly threw a hand over Yuffie's eyes to keep her from getting a closer look. The Crown Prince barked out a sharp exclamation that seemed to break the two apart. The other two spectators, some baldheaded man in sunglasses and another rather oddly-dressed female turned and looked in his direction. Ordering Reeve to take Yuffie in the house for a brief delay, he decided to go deal with these disrespectful, young hooligans himself/

Initially Kiyoko was startled out of her mind. She wasn't used to any of her customers being this forward with her or this rough. Once she regained her bearings she roughly shoved the man off of her and gave him a good backhand across the face. One of her large rings cut a small gash across Reno's face. Running off back in the direction of town, her friend turned around and vomited a string of abuse at her friend's attacker.

"Look, you sick fuck! That's just wrong! You don't do that to a girl! Do we look like a couple of common whores to you?!"

The cheeky redhead wanted to add his piece to that, but kept his tongue firmly placed between his molars, and let her continue her tirade. There was anger flashing in those green eyes of hers, made to look even more fierce with copious amounts of colorful makeup.

"I don't know what kind of fucked-up slum you were brought up in, jerk, but neither of us are the kind of girls who would EVER defile ourselves with your filthy money, probably for some seizure-like spasm of five minutes!! So if you're looking for someone to screw, I'll tell you this; GO FUCK YOURSELF!!"

The other girl quickly turned and ran after Kiyoko, holding her hand over the clips in her short black hair to keep them from falling out.

Vincent had been meaning to walk down and give them all a piece of his mind, but instead stood on the driveway watching them with an amused smile hinting at the corner of his lips. It was like watching some really bad high-school drama or something. Instead of chastising them further, he instead turned back towards the mansion and decided to let them leave on their own, focusing his attention on the matter at hand; taking Yuffie around to see Nibelheim.

Reno spat out a small infusion of saliva and blood, from where he had bitten himself from that slap. Rude looked at him stunned, unable to make so much as a comment about what just happened. On the one hand, he did feel guilty, fully knowing that he had mistaken the girls for...working girls...too. On the other hand, he never would have thought that Reno could behave like such an animal.

"Dumb bitch..." Reno spat once again and rubbed the back of his sleeve across the cut on his face. "What the fuck does she know about me? I bet whoever she IS fucking is just some two-minute sweat seizure, that's why she accuses ME of being a spaz. Whore."

Rude had enough. Taking a few strides up to his partner, he grabbed him by the shirt collar and shook him violently.

"What the Hell is wrong with you, man? You're acting like a Godforsaken animal! This isn't the Reno I know! Sure, he might be a womanizer, but he's not some vicious brute who goes around saying things about women that would make the most vulgar of pimps blush! I didn't think you were the type to be such a stupid, self-centered asshole! Get over yourself! Do you really not take notice of what a complete and utter prick you're being?"

Reno one solid hit to the face, he sent the already embarrassed man sprawling, walking away agitatedly as the redhead scrambled to his hands and knees. He stopped when he heard a strangled cry from the direction behind him. He had never heard Reno cry before.

"Look, yo. I know...I know this just ain't me! Look at this monster I've become! I'm treating decent girls like trash, I'm acting like a total jerkwad, and I haven't even been a good Turk lately! I'm real fucked-up yo! Just like that broad said! But I just don't feel like I can ever be normal again, knowing that I can't have what I want! Haven't you ever been in love? Can't you spare me just an ounce of compassion? Look at me, partner, look at me..."

Rude turned around and picked his partner off the ground. He held him by the shoulders, only with much less hostility this time, and forced Reno to look at him.

"Reno...if this really means that much to you, maybe we should just tell her the truth. Maybe we should just sort this whole mess out and make things right. And maybe then you'll have a fair chance at having her."

"But Rude, I'm just a second-rate, half-ass Turk. A man like me don't have anything to offer a princess, straight outta heaven, like her."

Rude noticed to his horror, that the Crown Prince of Nibelheim was emerging from the palace with...Yuffie and Reeve?! Quickly hitting the panic button, he grabbed Reno and started moving them rapidly in the direction of the inn.

"Look buddy, maybe right now isn't the right time to make this call. Let's just go back to the inn and you can clean yourself up and decide what you think is the right thing to do."

Reno noticed Rude's sudden hurried demeanor and shot a glance back at the palace to see what had spooked him. He felt the bile rise in his throat as the princess herself was locked arm in arm with one Vincent Valentine. The Crown Prince.


	14. Desensitized, Too Sensitive

Disclaimer: Same as always!!

A/N: It's so time to get Reno off this whiny, angst-trip, don't you agree? Anticipate it!

The princess, _his_ princess, had her arm snaked chummily through Vincent's. She was smiling - no, beaming, at the unusual show of affection from the usually cold man. She was gawking up at her companion with the look of some star-struck teen, finally meeting her idol.

_Maybe that's what she is..._The Turk thought sulkily, _Maybe that's how she truly feels. Has she forgotten about me already?_

The fighting spirit had long since deserted Reno, and though he was burning with jealousy, and a raging anger over what seemed to be his defeat, these two things were causing him to be sick and to despair as well. He turned away from the trio and threw a buddy-like arm across Rude's shoulder.

"Come on man, let's get out of here. We don't need to be causin' any trouble."

The darker man was surprised at how quickly the feisty redhead had changed his tune, but didn't hesitate to take him up on this, not even wanting to know what kind of Hell would be raised if this all blew up in their face. Grabbing hold of his still-unsteady partner, he walked them slowly back to their inn, which was incidentally, not far of a walk.

When they finally got to their room, which seemed to take aeons because of Reno's dragging steps, no longer filled with the cocky swagger and upbeat bounce, Reno sat himself down on the edge of the bed and held his face in his hands. Rude had been right. He was going more than insane, he was going psycho. He couldn't imagine that he had just spoken to that girl the way that he had, or had been treating even his best buddy in ways that he didn't know he was capable of behaving. Lying back on the cold bed he sighed heavily. Already resigned to live life alone and devoid of the shine and the fire that had once enveloped his soul. Before that vampire of a little girl had come and drained it all away.

The next thing he felt was a stinging pain in his kneecap, only to find that Rude had taken a seat at the coffee table, and thrown his shoe at the prone man.

"What the Hell...?"

"No sleepin' on the job, slacker!"

"We're on vacation, don't give me this 'job' bullshit. What, what is so important that ya hadta go and throw your smelly-ass shoe at me?"

"Look, the only thing you should be thinking about is how to get the Princess to like you, stupid."

Reno gave Rude a sour look.

"Man, why you even gotta go and bring up a bad topic like that, yo? You know the game is over for me. There ain't a chance in the world now that she's got her pretty little Princess Vinnie-sha Valentino..."

"Coz we're not throwing in the towel just yet, partner. We'll figure out the finer details later, like how to explain to Kisaragi-Taisho what's going on, or how to get Reeve on our side, but for now I want you to think of what you're going to do directly to get her to fall further in love with you."

"Further in love? Rude, ya gotta be yankin' my chain. It don't even seem like the kid remembers me."

"If she kissed you the way you said she did, there is no way she could have forgotten you. Girls are strange creatures, my friend. They may look at you like they don't know a thing about you, but once you touch her, she'll remember. They're very feeling oriented."

Reno cracked a smile at Rude's very dry sense of humor.

"Yeah, nice one buddy. But what am I gonna do?"

"Well first, we're going to have to work on a plan on how to get Reeve and the Crown Prince out of the way, even if only for an hour. And then we'll work on the game plan in sum total. Okay?"

"Gotcha. Man! I haven't felt this up to a challenge in years! This is like some kickass RPG or somethin' yo! Save the princess from the baddies or somethin' like that."

Rude gave Reno a funny look.

"You should really lay off the booze for a while..."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Vincent was glad to see that the ruffians had cleared themselves off of his lawn before he took his guests out. It was a bit of unpleasantness that he didn't want to be the first sight on their little tour.

He took Reeve to see the little rose-garden where he had his first unaccompanied talk with Yuffie. She looked away uncomfortably, recalling that little session, but was instantly put in better spirits when Vincent had artfully plucked a few miniature roses for her hair, dethorned them, and placed them between the clips that was holding her bangs away from her face. She blushed and smiled in a very girlish manner, much unbecoming of her usually tomboy nature.

"You look beautiful today, Yuffie."

"Th-thanks, Crown Prince Vincent."

"Just call me Vincent."

She practically melted at the warm tones.

Reeve stood by enthusiastically, absolutely amazed at the bashful aura that seemed to permeate from his charge. Usually he was a pretty obvious presence, putting himself on the radar with whoever he was with, but between these two he didn't really want to make a scene. He didn't want to interfere. He couldn't believe that things were going the way that they were. The most impressive thing was the level of maturity that Yuffie was showing she was ready to commit to. Suddenly the brashness and the flippancy had drained out of her. Suddenly she was more woman than girl. But there was something uneasy he felt about the change too. Just a few nights ago she had cried, saying she didn't want to lose who she was inside. But here there was such a radical change...he wasn't sure what to make of it.

They were well on their way to lunch when the first untoward incident happened to pop up.

Yuffie had gone from an attempt at mawkish sophistication to girlish curiosity. She had grabbed Vincent's prosthetic arm and ran her fingers up and down it. He didn't feel the touch at first because of the metal gauntlet he wore over the arm to cover what it looked like. But when her fingers found their way into his, he felt the tug of something unusual and whirled on the startled girl. Reeve at this point had been following at a comfortable pace behind them, and stopped in his tracks to observe. From his vantage point it just looked like Yuffie had tried to hold Vincent's hand and startled the prince. He didn't notice the mistake until he heard him yelling and saw him grab her in a way that was most unbecoming of a way for a prince to treat a young girl.

Vincent savagely threw Yuffie's hand away from his own and gripped her sternly on the upper arm with his prosthetic. The metal gauntlets were digging fine grooves into Yuffie's porcelain skin, reddening and starting to bruise a bit from the tenacious grip. He didn't know just how powerful the arm was or how much pressure he was exerting.

"I'm only going to tell you this once; don't you EVER touch this arm again. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?!"

Yuffie shivered and started to cry, nodding her assent and apologizing profusely.

When he let go, there was a grotesque anomaly of a claw-shaped hand mark, darkly intruding on the young flesh.

Reeve seethed with rage.

one should treat the princess like that.

_But she had done something she probably should have known better than to do..._

It doesn't matter! That's just not good form!

_You're just a peon. Keep your mouth shut. You can sort this out with Yuffie later, when you are alone._

's gotten into her? Why is she taking that kind of treatment? Normally she would have severely beaten a man who treated her as such!

_Maybe she's becoming the soft little woman her daddy's always wanted..._

Reeve, going only so far as his role could go, quickened his pace and walked up between the two.

"Is there a problem?"

Vincent looked at him darkly, but quickly tried to soften his expression. Yuffie shamefacedly pulled down on her shirtsleeve to conceal the unsightly mark.

"Nothing. Let's go back to eat, shall we?"

Without even waiting for a response, Vincent made his way back in the direction of the mansion, while Reeve quietly wiped the tears from Yuffie's face and whispered to her.

"_It will be okay. Promise._"


	15. Just Go Ahead Now

Disclaimer: As always, nothing belongs to me!

A/N: Everyone's been acting so damn strange, huh? Well, it wasn't without reason. I'm pretty sure I've written this story with this one chapter in mind. Everything (well, almost) is about to be remedied so the real fun can begin! Enjoyyyy!

Back at the mansion a facsimile of lunch was attempted, but the still-shamefaced young princess got up abruptly during the meal and stalked off towards her room. Reeve shot a nasty glance at the Crown Prince, who didn't even see it, as he was staring blankly at the meal in front of him. Following his young charge, Reeve exited the dining hall and left Vincent to brood or stare or whatever it was that he was obliged to do.

Upstairs in the bedroom, Yuffie took to throwing herself on the bed, as she had so often been doing lately, as Reeve pulled out their suitcases and started packing. The young girl took no notice of this and just lay there, as still and as quiet as a corpse. Her guardian muttered and huffed to himself noisily about the kind of treatment they had been subjected to, and all other sorts of "Who does he think he is, anyway!?"-like admonishments. He was in such a furor that he didn't notice the girl had long since drifted off to sleep. Reeve really wondered what had happened to that spunky young girl that he used to take care of. Lately she was acting so meek and demure he couldn't help but wonder what was going through her mind. He wondered a lot if this is what she thought would make Vincent like her more. Someone lady-like and quiet; the exemplary Wutain woman. If this was the case, she was better off forgetting about the marriage and being herself. He knew by the deadened look in her eyes that there was no way she could ever be happy trying to pretend to be someone who she clearly wasn't, even if it meant giving up the hope of winning over a man she had always secretly hoped might be her's someday.

Walking up to his young charge, he gently nudged her until she responded. She looked up at him defeated and ashamed.

"Why don't we just go home, Princess?"

She shook her head defiantly.

"Come on, there's no use in being stubborn. This is no way for a beautiful young girl like you to be treated, for any reason. Is he really worth all this trouble? Worth all this heartache?"

"You don't understand, Reeve. I'm trying my hardest. I really am! I just want him to like me, that's all. And can you imagine what kind of shame I would have to endure if I went home now? Without even the slightest hope of hearing something good come out of this? I never used to care...but something in me does now. Something in me wants to do good and make everyone proud. And for once...I'd like for someone to love me. Even if it's not really for me."

She started to cry. Reeve stroked her hair consolingly and said nothing. He didn't know what to say.

Breaking the silence was the low-pitched buzz of Reeve's PHS ringing. Getting off the bed he hurried to answer it and quickly surveyed the number. It wasn't one he recognized.

"Reeve Tuesti of Wutai."

A midtone voice with a slight gangster drawl that he remembered oh-so well replied, startling him.

"I know who it is, dumbass. That's why I called this number, yo. Can we meet somewhere? I gotta favor to ask ya."

Glancing over at Yuffie who had once again fallen into a melancholy slumber, he replied:

"I suppose. Meet me at the bar by the inn at Old Nibleheim in fifteen minutes. Don't keep me waiting."

Hanging up, Reeve once more checked the young girl lying in bed. She was sound asleep.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reno shot Rude a thumbs-up. It looked like this wasn't a completely hopeless case. After all, Reeve hadn't hung up on him.

"The bar next door in fifteen."

'"Let's not keep the guy waiting."

The redhead rolled his eyes and shook his head as he rose from his chair.

"Man, you guys with goatees must all think alike coz he said the same damn thing."

The other man said nothing as they walked out of the room.

Reeve, who thankfully met no resistance leaving the mansion, nor did he run into that cad Vincent, easily spotted the two men, dressed as usual in their Turk uniforms. Coming up to their table, he sat down to a cool beer, pre-ordered for him by the two other men.

"Look, guys. I've been having a pretty terrible weekend. So if you're here to cause trouble could you please reconsider and just lay low, for my sake?"

"Sorry bud, no can do. But I totally understand your having a terrible weekend thing. I ain't been doin' all that great myself. And I'll tell you why. It's all coz of that cute-ass girl you introduced me to."  
color shot up into Reeve's face almost instantaneously.

"You will NOT refer to her in that manner in my presence! Do you understand me?!"

"Ay man, what's got yer panties all up in a bunch?"

Even Rude was slightly shocked at the outburst.

"The Princess is here because she's trying to seal a...deal of sorts with the Crown Prince of Nibelheim."

Reno looked away with a sour look on his face.

"Yeah, tell me somethin' I DON'T know."

"Well, it's not going over quite as well as one would hope. Not that it's any of your business mind you. But it's been really hard on her, and I'm begging you not to go and 'chase her tail' so to speak, just because you're infatuated with her. This could be something serious if things go well, and I don't want to see her hurt any more than she already has been. I may only be her guardian, but I've raised her like my own, and it would kill me to see some idiot with a hormone-induced crush either make things harder for her, or ruin something that could be good. Okay? Level with me."

"See, that's the problem yo. I thought the same thing as you at first. I thought that this was just me thinkin' with the wrong head and trying to get her because I like the chase, and boy was this fox elusive. But then somethin' inside of me changed. I became like some kinda animal coz I realized for the first time in my life...I'm in love. And of course I had to fall in love with the one person I could never have. But if things are going as stupidly as you say they are, then Reeve, you got the power to change that. You can help her by helping me. This ain't a joke; I'm strung. I'm gonna love that girl from here til the end of the world...and all I ask is just an hour, just a chance to show her. And whatever happens, well, ya know, does. She can laugh in my face and I'll give in, a broken man. Or she can love me, and I'll work it all out. Coz I'm in this for the long haul, yo."

Reeve looked down, clearly vexed, at his empty beer mug.

"You guys must have slipped me something. Otherwise I think I just might have heard you wrong. It sure sounded to me like you want to try and get the princess to like you. And not just because you want to get in her pants, so to speak. Are you serious?"

A fierce light seemed to blaze in Reno's already bright eyes.

"Dead serious. What can I do? Will you help me? That's probably a stupid question. I don't see why you would...you have no reason to. I bet you're rooting all the same for that schmuck Valentine."

"I'm going to do the opposite and level with _you_. Yuffie...well...she's been in such avid pursuit of...this union, that she's not been herself lately. She's been rather depressed and acting very...submissive. I understand that she wants to make everyone proud and that she's had a girlish crush on the Crown Prince ever since she caught sight of him, but I don't think she's following through for the right reasons. She's been seeing a rather unsavory side of him throughout our little trip, and well, I wish she would see that these are his true colors and that she should not pursue him if she is only doing it for the sake of an infatuation and honor."

"Man, ain't nobody in this world she should have to change for. She's perfect just the way she is. A little hotheaded but--"

"Who are you to talk?" Rude interjected.

Giving his partner a knowing grin he nodded.

"Exactly."

"Huh. I'm going to be honest with you. I don't exactly trust you guys. For obvious reasons. You're also going to have a Hell of a time getting this okayed by Kisaragi Taishou, but honestly, I think you could get Yuffie to see things differently. Get her to understand that she shouldn't have to change herself. Or maybe just get her to recognize the change to begin with. So here's the deal. I'm going to give you one hour with her. I'll sneak her out and cover for you all for the span of an hour. All I ask is that you are prompt, and that you do not do anything that would compromise her integrity. Do you understand?"

Reno nearly killed Reeve in his enthusiasm as he clapped the man hard on the back and sputtered a plethora of jumbled phrases of gratitude and promises to follow by his terms.

"I'll call you when you can swing by the very front entrance to the path that leads up to the mansion to get her."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reeve had no trouble bypassing Vincent or any of his guards or staff. After the incident that had taken place earlier in the day, he had as little to do with his guests as he possibly could. He did send word that they were free to go and do as they pleased or order what they like and he would take care of it, but for the meantime it seemed as though the Crown Prince was abandoning them for a bit.

The biggest difficulty was convincing Yuffie to go out herself. Making flimsy excuses of having some things to do, and knowing full well that the Prince wasn't going to interfere, he managed to goad her into going out, claiming that it would be good for her, and one never knows whom one might run into.

After Yuffie had begrudgingly trudged out of the room, Reeve quickly PHS'd the two waiting men. Rude had agreed to pick the young girl up at the gate. After everything was settled, it was all just left to waiting.

Rude finally spotted the slow-moving form of the Princess approaching the front gate. She staggered as though she had little to no impetus for movement and seemed to struggle to continue walking. When she met him at the gate she was startled. She had never seen him before.

"Miss Kisaragi?"

"Who are you?"

"I'm a friend of someone you know."

"...That's nice. Who?"

"I can't really say. But I'd be much obliged to show you if you'd come with me."

"How am I supposed to know you're not some crazy kidnapper out to steal me and use me to get ransom money outta my dad?"

"If that were the case do you think I would bother standing here talking to you in front of the Crown Prince's mansion?"

Wincing at the mention of the Crown Prince, she nodded.

"Fair enough. I guess I can humor you for a bit. But if you try anything funny I'll go straight-up shinobi on your ass."

"Sure."

Taking her gently by the arm, he walked her over to a small bar further away on the outskirts of Old Nibelheim, bordering into the newer part of the country.

They walked into the bar, arm in arm, and sat down at a table not to far away from a shabby little stage at the center. Someone was just clearing off of the stage, having been booed off for reading a piece of terrible poetry. It was open mic night at the bar.

Rude gave a thumbs up in a random direction. Yuffie took no notice, as she was too busy flagging down a waiter to get her a drink. Just as she finished ordering a bottle of their strongest sake, the next act was making his way to the stage as the MC semi-introduced him.

"This young man wished to go unnamed, hopefully not because his act sucks. He did say that he would like to dedicate this to a beautiful young lady, whom he also wished to leave unnamed, but she should know who she is. Supposedly. Let's hope he doesn't make an ass of himself. Here we go!"

A tall, lanky man, with an unruly shock of red hair got up on stage and waited for the music to queue. He was so nervous that he didn't dare look to see where the girl he was singing for was sitting, lest he break his already strained concentration. Once it hit the specific point he was waiting for, he let forth a melodic wail.

"R...Ruuuude?!"

She was stunned and barely caught snatches of what he was singing to begin with.

"_...One, two, princes kneel before you ... Princes, princes who adore you; just go ahead now. One has diamonds in his pockets - and that's some bread now. This one, said he wants to buy you rockets, ain't in his head now. ... Marry him, your father wil__l condone you - How bout that now. Marry me, your father will disown you - he'll eat his hat now. Marry him, or marry me. I'm the one that loves you baby can't you see? I ain't got no future or family tree but I know what a prince and lover ought to be...S__aid if you want to call me baby - Just go ahead now. And if you'd like to tell me maybe, just go ahead now..."_

She lost the thread of the rest of what he was singing because she was so shocked at what was happening. He was by no means a good singer. In fact, he was a little less than mediocre. But the fact was that she knew it, she knew that he was singing for her. And after everything she had gone through this weekend it felt good to know that someone was going out on a limb for her for a change.

He was just wrapping up the song as he grabbed the mic off the holder and went down in front of her where she sat and sang her the last, and most relevant part of his song to her.

"..._Come on forget the king and marry me!!..."_

Yuffie looked away from him, blushing furiously. Most of the people in the crowd had caught on to this already by the way he kept looking around the room as though to spot someone. Once he had gained the courage to keep looking at her, they noticed that he never once peeled his eyes away from her, even as she seemed not to be paying attention to him.

The MC started a round of applause for him as some amused and encouraging laughter rang out with praise and much clapping for his alright performance. Even the MC, who was not impressed with his singing, at least acknowledged his bravery and humor.

After taking a bow and swaggering off-stage with pride, he grabbed a chair and swung it round to the table where the Princess sat. She wouldn't look at him but still hid her cherry-red face while gulping down sake by the cupful. Rude grinned from ear to ear, impressed by his partner. He wasn't sure he would have actually gone through with it, and secondly, he wasn't a terrible singer. For being Reno anyway.

The redhead threw a cavalier arm around the girl and beamed.

"So how'd I do, Princess? Wanna jump into bed with me and start workin' on being mine for life?"

The girl, feeling a bit of that old fire coming back into her, whacked his arm off her shoulders and turned and glared at the young Turk beside her.

"Look, you. Just who do ya think you are goin' around and touchin' me like that? Last time we talked all you wanted was some action. Lemme tell YOU something buddy, the only thing you're gonna get from me is a fat lip!"

"Only if it's around my--"

Throwing one good left hook she caught him in the cheek. He fell of his barstool, but he grinned at her wildly as he rubbed the spot she hit.

"Yeah! That's what I like about you!"

She raised an eyebrow.

"Or maybe love."

Rude bowed his head and laughed quietly to himself as the girl sputtered and flung an empty cup at the fallen man's head. He blocked it and kept laughing and smiling, until she could do nothing but join in too.

An exerpt from "Two Princes" by The Spin Doctors © The Spin Doctors 1991


	16. Star Light, Bar Night

Disclaimer: Same as always! I still don't own a thing...

A/N: Nuu! I refuse to let this story die! The school semester was over so I had a bit of time where I needed to study for finals and move back home for the summer. Anyway, I won't bore you all with my life's details. Enjoy the newest chapter! Drink up me hearties, yo ho?

Yuffie reluctantly offered the fallen Turk a hand so he could get back to his feet. She still had a mighty smirk on her face despite the fact that she was trying her damndest to hide it. He took her hand and got to his feet, finishing by giving her arm a hard jerk, causing her to stumble into him. He snared her in an aggressive bear hug, not even giving her the room to do more than struggle weakly and scream muffled obscenities. The young ninja was soon freed with a mild but firm knee to Reno's family jewels.

Reno laughed in spite of the sharp pain and let her go. He hadn't had this much fun in what seemed to be an eternity; though truthfully, it was only since he had last been with her.

"Keep your grimy paws offa me! Gawd you reek!"

"You know you like my manliness!"

"Feh. Whatever."

Both of them reseated themselves at the table as a waitress came by with a tray of appetizers.

The silly banter and fun havoc was soon replaced by a slightly awkward silence. Reno didn't know where to go from here. He didn't know what to say. He had hoped that the song would have said for him anything worth saying, but by the silence he could tell that it had not. Did she think he was just kidding?

"So, uh...how was my singin'? I think I could be like the next Nibleheimian Idol or something! Damn I'm good!"

Yuffie turned to him and rolled her eyes.

"Well, you did sing pretty well...considering I didn't think you could sing at all. I figured all that boozing and smoking would have killed any chance of your singing being worth half the effort it would take to listen to it."

Reno was actually slightly hurt by this. Espescially after he had sung that song just for her.

"Aw, come on Princess, you know you were impressed. By the way, you still never answered my question."

"Whaaaaat?"

"What about being mine for life?"

"..."

"Look, Reeve told me all about it. How that jerk Vincent's been nothin' more than a royal prick to ya all weekend. And for what it's worth...well, I don't think a girl like you should hafta put up with that kind of bullshit, ya know? You're beautiful, you're funny, you're fierce and outgoing, you've got a helluva temper, but all of that is what makes you you! And I know more than I ever knew anything before that I..."

Reno never got the opportunity to finish his sentence as Rude's PHS blasted some obnoxious ringtone to interrupt what would have been a perfect speech. The redhead shot him a dirty look as he answered, but all he could do was shrug sheepishly. He needed the PHS to have been on to know when Reeve expected Yuffie to be back. Something was wrong, this was way too early for them to have to come back. It had only been about twenty minutes or so.

"Rude, this is Reeve. This is an emergency."

"What's the situation?"

"The Crown Prince is looking for the Princess, he said he wanted to apologize to her about all the things that have been going on this weekend. I told him that she left the mansion to go and do what she would, so he left and is on his way to look for her. You've got to find a way to split up and finish this later. He could catch you all and blow your cover! Moreover, he probably wouldn't appreciate seeing his would-be fiancee in the company of another man. Please, hurry and leave. I'll call you later."

With that Reeve hung up and left Rude to deliver the blow.

"Would you excuse us for a second?"

"Uh, yeah. Sure..."

Yuffie was half overjoyed and half disappointed at the speech. She couldn't believe that someone thought that she was perfect just the way she was! On the other hand, it would have been one of the most validating events of the weekend just to hear that last part. Just to hear what he would have said if he hadn't been interrupted. Would she finally have heard someone tell her they loved her?

"The Crown Prince is on the hunt for her...he wants to explain himself."  
let out a muffled growl of frustration.

"Look, we don't have enough time to finish this, we have to bow out before he finds us and blows our cover or kills us for apprehending his guest. We have to go now, Reno."

The redhead looked ready to kill. He had finally gotten his opportunity to tell the girl how he truly felt and so many things were getting in the way. He didn't understand why alll of this had to come and hit him at once.

"But Rude, there's still so much I gotta say! I gotta tell her I love her. She has to know the truth before the night is out. She has to know that I'm not myself without her. She has to know the truth about everything. Including the fact that I'm not Rude Sparks, and that she should be Mrs. Reno Kobayashi-Kim. I need to tell her! I need to!"

"There will be time for that later! But right now you need to get your head in the game and make sure that this thing doesn't blow up in all of our faces! The stakes don't seem so high, but think about it. The Turks aren't a huge organization. In fact, we rely heavily on our reputation from other countries, world leaders and powerful figures to get the business that keeps us going. Do you know what making enemies of the King of Wutai and the Crown Prince of Nibelheim could do to not just us who are directly involved, but the entire organization as well? Do you want to be held accountable for the utter destruction of the entire Turks organization? I know that look on your face, you might think I'm blowing things way out of proportion, and I might be. But isn't it better to be safe than sorry? If you blow it now, you might never see her again."

The younger man knew he was right. Bowing his head dejectedly, Reno allowed himself to be escorted to the front to tell her that he had to leave her now.

"Look, Princess, there's a lot I still wanna say and all that, but for now I have to go. Word on the street is that that dope Valentine is lookin' for ya, and I don't think he's like it very much if he saw us together. Say you'll see me again."

"I will."

"I'm holding you to that."

Taking one last look at her, Reno walked out of the bar, feeling a strange mix of both hope and failure all at once. Still, he clung to that shred of hope tighter than the grip of despair tried to put his heart in a vice. She at least partly understood, and he was beginning to prove to her that his feelings were much more than simply some vulgar joke.

His blood raged inside of him as he saw his adversary entering the bar. Knowing better than to start something stupid at such a critical moment, both men bowed out gracefully, ducking into strategic nooks and crannies in order to avoid his gaze.

Vincent stuck out like a sore thumb; the whispers and stares grew and made him increasingly uneasy. He was dressed in a three-piece suit, definitely not bar attire, and towered over many of the bar's patrons. Girls gazed at him in awe and admiration, as the men glanced either enviously or preened themselves, clearly noting that every eye was on the handsome prince of the nation. Yuffie was still sitting at the table, looking a little dejected, but increasingly intoxicated, and hadn't noticed a thing.

The young Prince sat beside her and recieved the cold shoulder. She hadn't even bothered to look at him.

Taking up her glass and pouring himself a drink, he sat in silent awkwardness for a bit until he finally mustered up the courage to take her hand in his and speak.

"Miss Kisaragi...Yuffie. I don't know what to say."

Silence.

"...There is absolutely no excuse for my behavior towards you these past couple of days. There is no amount of words or reasons that I can provide in order to excuse the way I've been acting. There is no reason why anyone as beautiful and intellegent as yourself should have to deal with what I have been putting you through. I don't come here to offer you excuses, but I do want you to understand. Will you please come talk with me? Let me tell you a little bit about myself, and perhaps, gain a little of your trust and forgiveness in return?"

She bit her lip reluctantly, but nodded and followed him out.

Sitting at a park bench under a moonless and almost starless sky, he spoke to her.

"I served in a war, many years ago. My mother and father had two children, myself and my older brother Seth. Seth was supposed to become the next ruler of this country after the death of my parents. However, he went mad and ended up being killed in an incident in the northern quarters of the world. I was off serving in the war while my brother was going out of his mind. It was pure coincidence that not too soon after he had been dispatched, I was discharged from the army for losing an arm after saving one of my comrades from a back attack from one of our allies. My mother and father took very good care of me, seeing as how I was now the last hope to keep the Valentine name alive in the Royalty of Nibelheim. Dr.Saburo Hojo of the Shinra Lab Department was the man who performed an operation to attatch a new arm to my body. There was also a nurse there...whom of which did her best to see that I recovered fully."

Yuffie sat in silence, listening to him telling her things she already knew. It was only this last part that made her pay close attention, something told her that there was more to this story than met the eye.

"I...I fell in love with this woman. She was a Wutain - by birth anyway. I don't know where she grew up or any of that. Sometimes I even wonder if it was love and not just some kind of savior syndrome. She made me feel alive and human again in times where I never thought that things would be the same. I lost my brother and an arm to boot, and only gained the true love and acceptance from my parents out of some kind of pride in the family name. No matter how bitter and impatient, belligerent and unkind I was, she did her best to make me become something better, and try to recover. However, I didn't realize that she was Dr. Hojo's wife until it was too late.

Even then I stayed by her side. She was pregnant with Hojo's child. Hojo conducted experiments on them to test some kind of biological enhancement drugs. I disagreed with the whole thing, but I could only protest, not prevent. That is something I can't forgive myself for. In the end, she died giving birth. Saburo wasn't there, he was too busy conducting his silly research experiments to come to his wife's side as she labored to bring their son into the world. That is something I cannot forgive him for. You...remind me so much of her..."

"No."

Vincent was startled as the young ninja princess shook her head.

"I'm nothing like this girl from what you're telling me. Sure, we're both from Wutai, but if you knew a thing about me, you would see the differences."

"Yuffie, what are you talking about?"

"I'm not patient at all. I wouldn't bother trying to get some asshole to listen to me if it was for their own good and they didn't want to cooperate. I wouldn't let someone abandon me when I needed them most. I'd kick their ass from here to Midgar if they so much as disrespected me. Lastly, I would never marry someone who didn't seem to love me as much as I loved them. I can't spend forever wasting my time. I guess I've been so...awed and intimidated by you, these are things that I've forgotten about myself. Things I couldn't show you because I was afraid of scaring you away. But...I don't think I can pretend anymore without losing something precious to me - myself. And you, you need to let go of this girl in order to love someone else. If you can't, you'll just go on forever trying to find a substitute for something irreplaceable."

"...I never knew. Is this true? You've been playing some role in hopes of impressing me?"

"Go ahead and accuse me of being a liar if ya want. You can yell and scream and call me whatever, you can kick me out and tell me that I'm not suitable to be your wife or even a proper Wutain woman. I can't help who I am. I'm sorry I tried to be something I'm not. If you want, we can forget this whole thing and I can go home before I cause you any more trouble. Or we can start over and be who we really are. I won't hold back out of fear of chasing you away, and you won't pretend to see things that aren't really there. It's your call."

Vincent got up to stretch his long legs and pace around the bench as Yuffie sat there still, waiting to see what he would say. Part of her wanted him to tell her to go home, that he was sick of girls who couldn't be themselves around him and sucked up to him in order to try and get him to like them. Espescially knowing that there was someone out there who might love her exactly for what she was. On the other hand, she still secretly held some hope that he might say yes, that he wanted to get to know her; and maybe, just maybe, let her get to know him.

"I'm worried, Yuffie. I don't know if I can trust you if all this time you've been acting like someone you're not just to get in my good graces. There are so many who've done the exact same thing only to betray me in the end. On the other hand...from the strength you've tried to divulge to me tonight, I can plainly see that you've only done it because I intimidate you. Perhaps even because you truly feel something for me and want me to feel something for you in return. I can't make you any promises or guarantees, but I will vow that as long as you give me a few days of your honest personality, I will try to see you for you, and give you a part of myself in exchange. Can you agree to that?"

Yuffie smiled brightly as she nodded her head in excitement. She didn't need to hear his excuses or any pretty promises that would mean nothing the next day. She didn't even want to make up lies of her own to be what she couldn't. From this moment forward they were going to do their best to be themselves and see what came out of it.

Vincent extended an arm to her as though to escort her back to the mansion.

"I can walk just fine ya know."

He quickly withdrew, a bit stung but knowing she was just being herself. He was surprised to feel her slam herself into his side, grasping his hand and tugging him to a halt to make him look at her beaming smile.

"But holding your hand ain't a bad start."

He smiled down at her and led her back in the direction of the mansion.

She couldn't help but choke down a small wave of sad nausea as she thought about the red-haired man that led to help her become so strong, and wonder what choices she would make, whether they were wrong or right, and how long she could string along these two great men until she didn't stand a chance with any of them at all.


	17. Forget The King?

Disclaimer: Same as usual, still own teh nada.

A/N: Still crankin' 'em out! Thanks for reading and/or reviewing! Here's to you! Sorry this chapter is so short, I just wanted to post something to let you all know that this story hasn't been abandoned. A longer, more plot-moving post soon to come. Thanks so much everybody!

The nausea soon dulled into a low ache, which gave way to giddiness at being close to Vincent with all the walls torn down. His hand was warm and wrapped loosely around her slim fingers, his grip not only betraying an underlying fear of hurting her, but a fear of holding her too tightly too soon as well. He honestly didn't know what to think of her -- what she thought of him. It was like tap-dancing on a minefield, not knowing whether the show would go on or blow up in your face. He managed to keep his cool, read her moves, and respond accordingly. Maybe this was what he desperately needed to start piecing his life back together; a new start.

Yuffie was still pensive about letting all decorum fall away. After all, regardless of what happened between them, Vincent was still a Crown Prince. A part of her was still reluctant to cut loose, but she was tired of toeing a line that simply just did not exist for her. Moreover, she was a princess, and to date, the only guy who'd ever made her feel even slightly that way was..._Damn that Rude._

Yuffie and Vincent made their way back to the mansion, where he walked her all the way to her room and gave her an affectionate peck on the top of her head before departing. Reeve was fast asleep on top of some papers he was filing at the desk. Sometimes Yuffie wondered if there really was that much paperwork for him to be doing or if he just did it to pass time.

_He really needs to get a girlfriend. Or get laid. Or something._

She smirked as she noticed the rough humor was a slight mimicry of the aforementioned redhead's dark sarcasm. Though she had appreciated the tender affection that Vincent had shown her that night, she still couldn't help but fall asleep smiling to the sound of a poorly-sung karaoke song, and the image of a rakish Turk on his knees appealing to her in a humorous, but sincere way.

Said Turk was riding emotional waves that strung somewhere between euphoria and hysterical panic. On the one hand he was so happy that he had even been with Yuffie and worked up the courage to (nearly) tell her how he felt. On the other, he was worried that because he never got to tell her how he felt that after this weekend, he might never get another chance. After all, what if she actually decided to marry that pompous...?

Despite the downer that he had experienced towards the end of their little scheme, he still insisted that he and his partner go and get a celebratory post-making-an-ass-of-himself drink.

"Ohh man! I was amazing! Did you see that look in her eyes? I'm sure she totally digs me! Man, who wouldn't be impressed by a guy as good lookin' as me, with such a songbird of a voice and charm to win 'em all?"

Rude just chuckled and nodded along, unwilling to spoil Reno's good mood. It had been so long since he had acted like a normal human being.

"We've still got a ways to go, my friend. But I'm sure tonight helped your position a lot. Even Reeve was willing to help us out a bit. The Nibelheim festivities end tomorrow. Do you think she'll be staying any longer?"

"Aw, shit. That's something I totally didn't think about! What am I gonna do when she's back under her dad's protection from me? How will I even know when she's left? Damnit...just when I thought things were finally going my way you have to go and ruin it for me."

Rude rolled his eyes behind his dark sunglasses and took out his PHS.

"Aren't you forgetting something? We have someone on our side now. Anything we need to know I'm sure Reeve will be willing to inform us."

"I hope you're right. Otherwise this is gonna be an even bigger pain in the ass than it already is."

"Nothing can be a bigger pain in the ass than you. Especially when you're chasing a girl. Come on, let's head back to the inn. We'll get some sleep and call Reeve in the morning."

Downing the rest of his beer, Reno nodded his assent and practically skipped back to the inn, his high spirits a little bruised, but still intact.

As soon as Reno managed to peel open his eyes and shake the grogginess from his voice the next morning, he was already on the PHS, calling Reeve. Reeve hadn't answered the first two, three...six calls, but seventh time's the charm.

"Reeve Tuesti speaking."

"Whaddid I tell ya about that whole namin' yourself thing? Do ya think I'd bother callin' ya if I didn't know who it was?"

"Reno? What do you want?"

"Just callin' to check on how my princess is doin'."

"Yuffie?"

"No. You, lover-boy. Of course it's Yuffie ya dolt!"

"Oh. Well..."

Reno narrowed his eyes at the avoidance and hesitant nature of Reeve's response.

"Give me a second."

Reeve took a moment to excuse himself from the house, walking to the front gate, far from the spying ears of anyone in the mansion.

"I didn't really get the details from her yet, but apparently she and the Crown Prince made a reconciliation last night."

Those words hit Reno like a blow to the solar plexus. For a moment he was robbed of the ability to breathe, much less think about what to say; but once he regained his composure, he asked what he needed to know:

"What does that mean?"

"I honestly don't know. Whatever it was you did last night, DID managed to bring her back to her old self. But who knows what that means between she and Prince Valentine. On that note, we've also extended our stay til the middle of the week in order to allow her more time to get to know him. I really don't know if I ought to tell you this but...I really have my reservations about this. I see no reason why she should have to prove herself to him. If it was really healthy for either of them, they would get along unconditionally, regardless of whatever quirks or...nevermind. I'm rambling. Look, I can't really talk right now, but just know that anyone who can make her feel right when she's true to herself is good in my books -- not that I'm saying that person is you, but -- call me later, after I've had my coffee. All this babbling really isn't good for my PR."

With that, the phone went dead; and Reno was left sitting there with a puzzled look on his face trying to decrypt what Reeve had just said.

a fit of impatience, the redhead shot another call to Reeve's PHS.

"Goodness! I just finished talking to you? What's so important?"

"Set up a meeting with me and the Princess. This ain't no question. It's a demand. Call me when the deed is done."

This time it was Reeve's turn to sputter dumbly at a dead phone line.

Rude had awoken and only caught this final conversation, raising an eyebrow at the determined look on his friend's face. This was a kind of tenacity Rude had only ever seen Reno use while on a particularly rough job.

"It ends tonight. She has to know. Who I am, how I feel, and why it's so important that she ditches that dweeb and comes with me."

"Reno..."

"There's no reasoning with me now, partner. This is how it goes. Consequences be damned."

Rude looked at him sternly, brown eyes blazing with unanswered questions, apprehension, and a slight twinge of fear from the backlash of what his impulsive partner was going to do. Yet he knew there was no stopping the man once he set his mind on something. Shrugging with an air of defeat he nodded to Reno.

"Well. Sounds like it's going to be a Hell of a day. A big breakfast sounds good."

Reno broke into a charismatic grin and walked up to Rude, giving him a good-natured punch in the arm.

"I know I can always count on you!"

Rude half-smiled his assent, but heard the nagging thought in his head:

_Too bad thing the only thing I'M counting on right now is disaster._


	18. Said If You Want To Call Me Reno?

Disclaimer: I still don't own a thing. I hardly own this plot. No, wait...my muse owns that.

A/N: Still trying! Thanks so much everyone!

Usually Reno was a vacuum; able to suck up just about anything placed in front of him. However, this morning he picked at a modest short stack of pancakes, while occasionally dipping his fork into the slowly congealing sunny-side egg sitting on a side-plate.

Rude looked at him between bites of bacon, toast, and sips of orange juice. His partner's unusually vacant expression troubled him.

"Would you stop spacing out while looking at me like that? People are gonna think we're having a lover's tiff or something."

"Huh? Oh. Sorry. It's just...I'm a lil nervous."

Rude let a small smile slip. He had never heard Reno ever say he was nervous before.

"What's done is done. No turning back now. Besides, we don't even know whether or not Reeve is even going to set you guys up on a date yet. Until then, just lay low and keep cool. It'll all work itself out one way or another."

"Yeah...I guess you're right."

Reeve Tuesti was also sitting at a breakfast table, awkwardly picking at his morning meal as well. On the one hand he thought that Reno was in no way, shape, or form, anywhere near worthy enough for the young princess that he had so cared for after all this time. All the same, he had proven that he was at least...infatuated...with Yuffie for who she was; and that he didn't expect her to change at all. His mind was at odds with itself, mulling over what the right thing to do would be. He couldn't imagine what Kisaragi-Taishou would do to him if he made the wrong decision. A Crown Prince of Nibelheim who treated his daughter a bit questionably? Or a brash, young gangster who made her feel alright in her own skin?

Remembering he had to call said King of Wutai in order to inform him of their extended stay, he slipped out of the dining room and into the foyer of the front entrance.

'Good morning! This is Himiko of the Kisaragi Palace speaking, how may I direct your call?"

"Himi! It's Reeve!"

"Oh!! Why hello Reeve! How have you and the princess been doing? We're all very excited to have you back!"

"Well, actually, we won't be back today. The prince has decided to extend our stay here. I was actually calling to tell Kisaragi-Taishou this. Is he in at the moment?"

"Yes he is. He's just finishing up breakfast right now. Shall I connect you to his line?"

"Could you? Thanks!"

"You're welcome. One moment please."

"Godo Kisaragi."

"Good morning Your Highness, this is Reeve Tuesti speaking."

"Ah! Reeve! Splendid! How goes everything?"

"It's been a bit of...shall we say...an adventure. But everything seems to be going relatively well!"

"Superb. Shall I be anticipating your return today?"

"The Crown Prince has actually requested that I speak to you and see if you would not be willing to let us stay here for a few more days. He said that there are still a few more things he would like to learn about his potential bride-to-be."

Reeve's speech almost skipped a beat as he fabricated a bit of exaggeration on the Crown Prince's reasoning. He waited with bated breath to see whether or not the king had noticed.

"Hnn. I like the sound of that. This must mean that they are getting along quite well. Of course I would be happy to allow you longer visitation with the Crown Prince. Until when does he expect you to stay until?"

"Wednesday evening."

"Excellent. Well, then. I expect a full report and a wedding proposal by then."

Kisaragi-Taishou laughed heartily and thus missed the strained chuckle that Reeve managed to eke out from the back of his throat. He really hoped that the king was just kidding.

"O-of course, Sir."

"Return to my daughter and give her my regards. Let the Crown Prince know that I am more than happy to oblige his request. Until Wednesday."

Kisaragi-Taishou was about to hang up when suddenly Reeve caught his attention.

"S-sir!"

"Yes?"

"I...uh...I have a small question to ask, if it won't be of any trouble to you."

"You may ask."

"I was just wondering, if, hypothetically, let's say, some overeager young sprite...maybe of decent standing...were to try and...shall we say...interfere with these plans. Because, you know, he was...he discovered Yuffie's stay here and was quite...taken with her. What would you suggest a humble advisor do about such a situation.-- JUST if it were to ever...HYPOTEHTICALLY occur...?"

"Are you trying to tell me something, Reeve?"

"No! No, of course not! I just want to be adequately prepared should such an even arise!"

"Reeve, I assure you that I strongly believe that no such occasion should arise. However, to humor you, if it does, I am counting on my daughter to marry someone of much better than 'decent' standing, as well as someone who is not just infatuated with her, but loves her at least half as much as I do. I may not say it enough; granted I don't say it at all, but my daughter is my most precious thing in life. I love her very, very much and I would rather give my life, or even my entire kingdom than see her suffer. That is why it is so important to me that she marries well. Someone of high enough standing to not have a reason to ever take advantage of her, as well as someone who will love her and express it in ways that I have so failed to do. I know you understand me; you have raised her like a surrogate father. Don't allow her to make any mistakes that you would not allow a daughter of your own to make. Understood?"

Reeve pondered the unusual honesty in the old man's voice, and despite his king's inability to see him, nodded his head solemnly, and spoke aloud his assent.

"Of course. I'm sorry to even have asked such a ridiculous question, Your Majesty."

"No question is ridiculous in regards to my daughter."

With that, Kisaragi-Taishou hung up the phone before Reeve could detect the crack in his voice.

Yes. All this time he had cared very much that Yuffie find someone who would love her for who she was, as well as be able to take care of her and the kingdom that came with her. All this time she had thought that he had just wanted to make sure that she had a strong male to make all her decisions the way her father had made her mother's. But in all honesty, he just wanted to make sure that there was someone to be there for his precious little girl in a manner that he never did for his wife. He wanted someone that could love her, and show it.

Reeve knew what he had to do.

Yuffie came upstairs after her post-breakfast walk with Vincent. She had bantered randomly and skipped around from topic to topic, totally missing Vincent's surreptitious eye-rolling in her mild distraction. He did look at her quite sternly at times, and refused to laugh at her inappropriate jokes, but every now and then she would catch a small smirk curled on his lips, and the slightest sparkle in his reddish eyes.

"So after breakfast we just walked around and did nothin' really, but we talked a lot and he really needs to let loose. The guy can hardly smile at a compliment. He won't even laugh at my jokes."

Reeve looked at her and knew what he was about to do was risky. But he was willing to take that risk.

"That sounds interesting, Princess. What about your little outing last night?"

"Oh!! Can you believe the moment you convinced me to go there was some bald-headed dude who asked me to come with him coz he had somethin' to show me and alluvasudden he takes me to this bar and RUDE of all people is there and he..."

For some reason her speech faltered and she broke into a grin.

"And he?"

"He...sang a song for me and asked if I would be with him."

Reeve couldn't help but chuckle a bit at the utter flamboyance with which Reno had decided to try and woo the Princess, but it's not like he was expecting anything less from the brash, young Turk.

"What did you say to him?"

"Well, he was actually tryin' to say somethin' to me when someone called and told him that Vinnie was out looo------Hey!! That was you, wasn't it?!"

"Now why would I do such a thing? If you must know, I had been doing paperwork all night last night and never even realized that the Crown Prince had left until Miss Janice came and told me that he had left a message to alert me that he was no longer in the mansion and if I needed anything, to please let her know."

"Yeah...a likely story."

"You still haven't said whether or not you accepted his offer to 'Be with him.'"

"He asked if I'd see him again, and of course I told him yes, but...I don't know. Things just might be working themselves out with Vinnie, you know?"

"Let me be the Devil's Advocate here, Princess. Think about how Vincent has treated you for the past couple of days. Think about how you've been forced to act around him. You've been rather...diminutive in his presence, and for a while he was rather cruel, or at least that's what someone on the outside looking in might say. Now think about how Reno has treated you. He may not have been the most charming guy, but he's really beginning to prove that he's a good guy with sincere intentions deep down, now hasn't he?"

"Who's Reno?"

"Reno?"

"You said something about someone named Reno. Who the heck is that?"

"I said Reno? You must have heard me wrong. i said Rude."

"No. I heard you perfectly. You said Reno. And don't lie to me. When you lie your eye twitches. Which is what it's doing right now. So tell me. Who. Is. Reno?"

Reeve couldn't believe he had slipped up like that. It was an amateur mistake and he had only done it because he was so overcome with trying to get his point across that he didn't think hard enough about what he had said.

Recovering long enough to pull out his PHS and dial a number before looking at Yuffie gravely he said:

"Why don't you ask him?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It was a lovely little cafe on the outskirts of the newer Nibelheimian developmental area. Reeve had managed to make an excuse on the pretense of meeting up with an old friend of the family to get Vincent to let her get away for a few hours. Reeve had decided to hang back for a bit; he would decide whether or not it would be prudent for him to leave AFTER Reno got here. He had filled Reno in on the fact that his little cover was blown, and was scared witless at the thought of what could happen from here.

Reeve and Yuffie both sat at a more secluded table, each with a drink in front of them as they saw two men in navy blue suits enter the cafe. One was bald and wore dark sunglasses. The other had bright red-orange hair, piercing blue eyes, and goggle-like sunglasses perched on his head.

Rude stood a bit behind his friend as Reno gave a deep bow to the still-seated Yuffie.

"Princess Yuffie Kisaragi of Wutai, I'd liketa introduce my partner and I. This is Rude Sparks, first in command of the Turk Empire. I am Reno Kobayashi-Kim; second in command of the Turk Empire and...and I am in love with you."


	19. So In Love With Who

Disclaimer: I still don't own anything...likely never will ;;

A/N: Thanks for sticking with me, everyone! Sorry it's been so long but I've been trying to get my life in order. This is dedicated to all my readers/reviewers! Thanks so much!

Yuffie stared down into her cup of hot chocolate, unwilling to raise her eyes to look at the man bowing before her. Reno stayed bowed, noticing the silence. He shot a sideways glance to Rude who gave a small jerk of his head, indicating that his partner should straighten up. The lanky man raised his head and took a step back, first shooting a wistful glance at Yuffie, and then a pleading look at Reeve.

_After all..._ Reno thought bitterly, _ This whole mess IS kinda your fault ya know..._

Reeve reached over the table and gave Yuffie a small shake. The girl looked up at him blankly.

"You lied to me. All of you...why would you do that to me?"

"Princess...It was never meant to come this far. Will you give us all the chance to explain?"

Tears welled in the young girl's eyes as she shook her head, no.

"I don't care what any of you have to say for yourselves...you're all no better than my father! Manipulating me to try and get what you want!"

As she got up from the table and tried to run, Reno caught her by the hand and pulled her into a firm embrace, holding her tightly despite her struggling to get free.

"Look, at leave give _me_ a chance to explain, will ya? This whole mess was my fault.You ain't got the right to drag anybody in this but me. Okay? Come on, let's go for a walk."

Reeve and Rude looked on as the lanky Turk led the young ninja out of the cafe.

Sitting her down on a bench, Reno took a seat at her feet, looking up into her face as he spoke.

"My partner, Rude Sparks, he was the one who sent the letter. He's kind of a weird guy, you know? So he ended up gettin' cold feet and asked me if I would go see you instead -- coz he didn't want to stiff your father. I went, and at first I didn't think anything of it. I was just doin' my partner a favor...but then I saw you and got to know you a bit. And I couldn't help myself but I started to like you. Then when we got drunk and kissed..."

"We what?"

"...We got drunk and kissed. And I knew that you were the one that I wanted. But you were already off gonna try and get married to that loser Vincent Valentine...Crown Prince of this stupid...crummy...whatever. I'm just a second in command of an organization that ain't any better than a bunch of thugs. I don't know if I have anything to offer you. But I'm here to offer you myself, and my love, whatever that's worth."

"How do I know that any of what you're saying is true? You pretended to be someone completely different all this time. You probably just wanted in my pants or something! I don't see any reason at all why I should trust you. Coz I thought I did. But that was someone else..."

"No. It was me. The whole time. So I was borrowing my partner's name - big deal. The rest was really me. The guy that loses his temper and gets into fights with pretty girls, makes comments about cute asses, gets drunk and kisses a woman he's got no chance with, who comes all the way to Nibelheim, stompin' on the Prince's territory, and trying to steal his girl. This is all me. That night at the bar, when I was singing to you, I wanted to tell it all. But Reeve called and told me that Valentine was out looking for you. I had no choice but to let you go. I could have made the biggest mistake of my life, not just tellin' you and to Hell with whatever happened with him. Now the ball is in your court, and I don't know if you still want to play the game."

"Why now? I can't even pretend like I don't like you. Coz I do. Even if you're an impulsive smartass...I think that's why I like you so much. Is coz we got so much in common. I've never met anybody who could stand who I am, but you don't just deal with it; you understand me. But I think Vincent has the potential to understand me too. What am I supposed to do, Reno? What am I supposed to do?"

The redhead's eyes were brimming with angry, jealous tears. He hated the idea that she thought Vincent could be the one for her. He didn't want to even imagine that she could choose the Crown Prince over him. Unable to look her in the eye, he kept his gaze turned to the side.

"I don't know. You tell me."

Yuffie leaned down and extended a hand towards Reno's face. Gently guiding his head, she turned him so that he was looking at her, the pain threatening to spill from his baby-blue eyes.

She started first by kissing each eye, catching the tears in her lips. Then without warning, she kissed him full on the mouth, conveying a tenderness she had never felt towards another person. This wasn't admiration or a schoolgirl crush. There was a certain, soul-deep longing in the gentleness of her kiss. Reno kept his eyes closed and savored the overflowing of emotions that he was experiencing. On the one had, he felt bitter and defeated, knowing that it was only a matter of time before the princess set him free, realizing that he was not enough for her. On the other, he could feel all those things she was trying to hold back in the kiss. He wanted her to say she loved him. He knew she wouldn't. Managing to pull back, it was her turn to look away.

"It's not just about us. It's about my father too. The Kingdom of Wutai. The Crown Prince. Even the Turks. What we do from here could affect everything around us. We could destroy everything we've touched. Would you be okay with being responsible for that? Don't answer...because I'm not sure what I would say either."

Getting up and swiping at the tears on her face, Yuffie dusted herself off and offered her hand to Reno to help him up off the ground. The young Turk was thoroughly confused and could say nothing. What had been accomplished? The truth was out, sure. But what did that mean?

_And more importantly, who is she going to choose?_ _She doesn't get it...does she...For her sake, I hope it's --...for my sake, I hope it's me._

"Let's head back and talk to Reeve, okay?"

And what could Reno do but nod his assent and follow her back to the cafe, his heart slowly beating out a wistful tune...

"_...Come on, forget the king and..._"


	20. Backsides Revisited

Disclaimer: Same as always! Nothing belongs to me!

A/N: Thanks guys! Sorry the wait has been so long, but I'm baaack! Enjoy the new chappie!

xxxxxxx

Reno wanted very badly just to hold Yuffie's hand. There was something in him that broke when he saw her so sad. It was unnatural for the girl to look so stricken. Her face was made for smiles and laughter; not sombre stares and despairing reflection. In a certain sense he felt like she was a child. Not that she was vulnerable or naive -- he knew mucn better than to believe that. He knew in her kisses and in her fighting that she was full of passion and full of fire. There was an unextinguishable flame of life burning in her. There was a youthful vivacity full of funny faces and smiles at sunsets and the taste of forbidden fruits fresh from the tree that seeped from her. To see that fire dulled into a spark made him feel depressed and guilty, knowing that he was part of the reason her light was so dim.

But even if Reno could articulate all these feelings in his head; even if he could feel a protective tenderness towards her, he was not the kind of person who could outwardly express what he had felt so eloquently inside. Siding up to her and grinning in a wolfish sort of way, he reached towards her as if to grab her hand, but instead firmly gripped a nice handful of her unsuspecting behind. Giving a loud yelp and slapping him quite forcefully, Yuffie whirled on him and started screaming.

"Just what the heck do ya think you're doing?! You can't just go around grabbin' anyone's ass ya feel like you know! Geez! Can't you keep your hands to yourself for even a lil bit of time?!"

Reno started laughing and threw an arm over her shoulders. She responded only by crossing her own arms over her chest and huffing loudly.

"Look Princess. You don't have to worry about me touchin' nobdy's ass but your own. Got that? Coz yours is the only one I wanna grab."

Getting even bolder by the second, he quickly set a small kiss in her hair and let her go and gave her a slight shove.

Turning back and looking at him, she couldn't help but grin at the mock look of innocence plastered on his face. Able to stifle her lightheartedness for a second, she looked at him with her lower lip jutted out, pouting like a petulant child.

"That hurt ya know!"

"Come on, I didn't grab you THAT hard. Wouldn't want to damage the goods just yet."

She could only feign indignation for a moment before returning to a state of cheeky flirtation, smacking Reno's butt firmly, but playfully, sticking her tongue out at the dumb-struck redhead, and running gleefully ahead, laughing wildly, like a little girl, as he snapped out of his state of surpise and gave chase.

When they finally got back to the coffee shop they were both out of breath and ridiculously tousled. Yuffie's hair was a windblown tangle, and there were leaves clinging to her top. Reno's hair was sticking up in awkward places and his clothes were crooked. Both had clumps of mud and grass stuck in the soles of their shoes. Despite the utter disshevelment of their hair and clothes, nothing was more noticeable than how happy they looked. As they walked back into the cafe where Reeve and Rude sat chattling idly about politics and/or day-to-day miscellany, both men could not help but notice the smiles that for once, in a very long while, reached the eyes of the couple before them.

But to call them a couple was undoubtedly premature.

Even the steady ringing of Reeve's PHS and the formal tone (indicating that the person on the other end was the Crown Prince) was not enough to break the glee from which Reno and Yuffie were still high off of. He had bought them enough time to sit and have a small conversation together before they would be expected back at the mansion to do something or other with Vincent.

"So, what have you decided to do?"

The question hung in the air unanswered. Despite all the silly banter and carefree laughter, they actually hadn't come to a conclusion about how to deal with the situation. Reno was the first to speak up.

"Go with the flow, yo. Whatever happens, happens. All I know is that I've resolved not to touch anyone's butt 'cept this gal over here's."

Winking in her direction, and recieving only a mortified blush and a glare, he laughed. He didn't feel as though there were anything else he _could_ do.

Rude snorted into his drink as Reeve also shot the brash young man a look of disapproval. Looking to his young charge, this time he addressed her directly.

"Princess?"

"What he said."

"Sorry?"

"Just gotta see how things work out, right? I think I'm having a moment of clarity or somethin'. I'm thinkin' that things like this can't just be decided in an instant. As much as I would like to answer you guys and put this thing to rest, it's just not that simple, is it? It's not like before, on these stupid blind dates. Feelings are actually at stake for a change. And not just someone else's, but mine too. Sorry I can't quite say yet, but in the end I'm gonna do what will make me, and probably everyone else, happy."

Reno felt the slightest pang of jealousy and anger throb in him, but he realized she was right. She'd had a lot dumped on her in such a short period of time. She deserved some time to make the right decision. There was no point in telling him she loved him if she couldn't mean it the next day.

"That was pretty well-put. Didn't think you were capable of talkin' all pretty like that."

Idly tossing a strawberry at him, he deftly caught it in his mouth and munched at it while wondering vaguely if the fruit was so sweet because it was ripe, or if her touch alone had made it that much better.

"On that note, unfortunately, we must be going. I really hope from now on we can all be straightforward with one another. Please realize that this is a delicate situation, however, and should be handled as such. This would be a disasterous scandal if due care is not given. We'll talk more later, I am sure."

With a slight bow, and a strangely encouraging smile, Reeve motioned that Yuffie should get up to leave. All four rose and left the cafe together, Rude and Reeve walking a few paces ahead to the place where they must certainly part ways for a while. Yuffie shyly pecked Reno on the jaw and laid a gentle tap on his rear to remind him of the afternoon's events. He couldn't help but smile and return the gesture, watching her wistfully as she spun in lazy circles while walking towards the car that she and Reeve had arrived in.

"I take it things went well, partner?"

"As well as thing can be when you're stuck in a situation like this I guess."

"Hey, the fight's not over yet. You know better than to give up in the middle of a battle."

"You bet...but that look. Ya know...I just...I just don't wanna...I don't want her to get hurt. 'Specially not on my account. But at the same time, I wanna love her. I dunno what to do."

"Someone once told me 'There is no love which is not pain'. Meaning, if you really love someone, it's better to hurt than to not feel a thing at all towards them. Maybe that little spark just needs some agitation to become a full-blown fire. You get what I'm saying?"

"Huh...never thought of it that way."

"Well, either way, worrying about it is useless at this stage. We just gotta wait and see. Come on, let's head back to the inn. Maybe we can find something to do this afternoon."

With that, the two Turks headed off to their own car and headed back to Old Nibelheim; not so much parting ways with Reeve and Yuffie, but rather following the traces they left behind.

xxxxxx

"Princess? You're not mad at me, are you?"

"No...not really. I understand why you did what you did. It's just..."

"Yes?"

"Couldja just be straightforward with me from now on? I trust you and believe in you more than you probably know, so it would mean a lot to me if we could just be honest. Kay?"

Feeling both shamefaced and proud all at once, Reeve nodded his assent.

"I promise. From now on, honesty only."

Yuffie smiled, though he didn't see. Just one in a series that she hoped would only last.


	21. Little Pet Shop of Honors

Disclaimer: Same as always

Disclaimer: Same as always

AN: Thanks so much for all of you who continue to read and/or review (as well as sit, wait, and wish that I would update...) It means a lot to me to have your support. Thanks a ton. I know it's been a while, but I'm sure that's become old hat by now! On to the show!

Yuffie walked in the door with a smile still on her face. Reeve had made sure that she was cleaned up and straightened out before she entered the mansion in order to avoid arousing suspicion. Vincent smiled at her as she entered and asked her how her visit had been.

"Nothin' special. Just taking care of some business is all. How's things been at the mansion? Bet it's been so lonely and quiet without me! What do you do all day in such a big place? Hey, maybe you should get a pet to keep you company when I'm not around!"

A blank expression flitted across the young prince's face at the outpouring of babble, but he managed to hide the glazed expression well.

"A pet?"

"You know, like a cat, or a dog, or a turtle or something. Maybe you could adopt a Behemoth and train it to guard the house! That would be pretty cool. I've always had a soft spot for turtles, you know. Back in Wutai we have a place called the Happy Turtle. I've always wondered what that was about but..."

Realizing that she was beginning to rant she stopped mid-sentence and settled for a smile. Vincent was quite confident that she was happy -- or at the very least, content -- she wasn't usually this talkative when she was feeling down.

"Well. To be honest, I've never considered having a pet before. Perhaps it's something to think about."

"Why not today?"

"Excuse me?"

"I think you need a break from being cooped up in this stuffy ol' mansion all the time. All work and no play makes Vinnie a dull guy. Let's go out to the pet store!"

"Yuffie, I..."

"Come on. It's a great idea! Don'tcha think so too, Reeve?"

Reeve tried to stifle an unmanly giggle at the puppy-eyed pout his charge gave him.

"It sounds like an excellent idea, princess. Why don't you two go and look at pets? I'll wait for your return."

Yuffie beamed in appreciation for his support. The crown prince looked a bit off-put by her impulsive desire to go pet shopping, but conceded to taking her to the largest pet store in Nibelheim.

--

Vincent hated the pet store for only one reason; the name. Hojo's Pet Supply was the largest pet store in Nibelheim, and quite possibly in the world. Of course, Vincent could not verify this claim because he had never visited any pet stores outside of Nibelheim. You could find just about any animal you could even imagine wanting at Hojo's. (No relation to his _favorite_ scientist, of course.) They offered tiny wolf puppies to baby sea worms (indigenous to Costa Del Sol) and everything in-between. Yuffie was soon poking her face into a pen full of fluffy young Chocolings petting them and cooing at their soft downy feathers. She plucked a baby blue one out of the group and cuddled it close to her chin.

"Howabout a Chocoling? Lookit how cute this one is!"

Vincent crossed his arms and stood behind her, keeping his head down in an attempt to maintain a low profile. No one had YET noticed that the crown prince was in the store.

"I have plenty of Chocobos. They are all kept at a Chocobo-specific facility near the marshes."

"Oh. Sorry, cutie. Maybe next time." With a remorseful glance she placed the peeping Chocoling back in the pen with its siblings.

"Ooo!" Bouncing across the store she plucked up a tiny purple...puppy?

"What is that?"

"This is a Behemoth puppy! It's adorable!"

Vincent cringed at the thought of owning a pet that would someday turn into an animal rivaling the size of his house.

"Um. How about something a little more manageable? I'm not always there to take care of affairs at the estate. I also don't believe it would be fair to unload such a...burden on the house staff."

"Soooo...does that mean we're doing more than looking?"

"What?"

"You said to choose something more manageable! That means you'll get one, right?"

"I didn't say that."

"But you didn't say otherwise either."

Narrowing his eyes at the tricky ninja in front of him, he deemed it better to stay silent than further lose his case.

The young girl did nothing more but smile winningly at him and move to the next interesting animal.

"How about this one?"

Yuffie reached into a tank and bought out a small hatchling that looked a lot like a fat cobra.

"Yuffie, I really don't think that a Zolom would be any better than a Behemoth."

"Pooper."

Vincent, in an effort to quell her constant plucking up and inquisition of various (and quite random) animals started to look around as well. He happened across a curious little group of lizard-like creatures swimming around happily in an aquarium. The name loomed curiously on a white-board, piquing his interest.

"Ax...Axolotl. Hm."

"Heeeeey, those are cute!" Yuffie reached into the tank and was promptly nipped by a spunky little white fizzard. "Yeek!"

Vincent snorted at the flailing mass of limbs. He was a bit alarmed when she fell to the floor, landing firmly on her rear, when she suddenly jumped up and scrambled on hands and knees to a lower shelf.

"Yeeee!! Omygosh look! it's a tuuuurrrrtle!! Look at how small and cute it is!!"

Sure enough, when Vincent bent down, there was a tiny tan turtle lazily crawling along a rock. It stopped to look at the gushing wad of flesh that had pressed its face up to the tank in an effort to get closer to it.

Vincent plucked the turtle from its tank and took it to the nearest sales associate.

"We'll take this one."

The young girl wasn't paying very good attention as she started to rattle off the things that he would need to take care of a turtle.

"Well, you're also going to need a tank. And some food. And also...OH HOLY CRAP IT'S V--!!"

A firm hand clamped over her mouth and a shifty little ninja put the girl in a headlock.

"Lookihere Miss. We're trying to keep a low profile, so if you wouldn't mind, couldja please not start hollering about things here?"

The woman nodded as best she could in the surprisingly strong grip of the little girl. Brushing herself off and straightening her clothes and hair she managed to offer the due respect to the royal highness of Nibelheim.

"I'm SO sorry, sir. It's an honor to meet you! I can't tell you how much I admire you! You're an amazing leader, sir. If it wouldn't be too much to ask, could I please get your autograph when you're done shopping? My name is Susannah, by the way. Please, please let me know if there is anything I can get for you!"

"I would greatly appreciate it if you could just sell me this turtle and whatever other things I might need in order to keep it alive and well."

"Sure thing! You bet! Yessir!"

The flustered girl bounded around the store gathering a tank, food, pebbles, decorations, and other miscellaneous items she thought the crown prince might want for his new pet. Yuffie and Vincent ducked into a corner, doing their best to look inconspicuous until the girl's violent fit of excitement and panic settled into a heap upon the counter in front of the cash register.

"Will that be all?"

"It appears so. Your total comes out to...6,254 gil." Yuffie's eyes almost fell out of her head as the bulged out upon hearing the total. Sure, she was royalty too, but she couldn't imagine spending that much in one fell swoop. On a pet. On a whim.

Thinking nothing of it, he plopped down a 10,000 gil bill and took out a card from his wallet. In beautiful script he wrote out "Susannah, thank you for all your help. Take care. - Crown Prince Vincent Valentine."

Susannah tried to hand his change back to him, which he gently pressed back to her, offering a small smile.

"Keep it. Here's your autograph, as promised. Thank you."

Picking up the tank full of necessities and accessories, he left Yuffie to carry only the turtle.

--

When they returned to the mansion Yuffie had inundated the turtle, and consequently Vincent, with her coos and squeals of affection. Although the squeak of her overjoyed voice was so unfamiliar to his ears that sometimes he got slightly rattled at the sound, he was quite pleased to be so sure that she was happy. Walking into the main foyer, they were surprised to see a pacing Reeve, looking slightly disturbed.

"A...woman, has come to see you. We told her you were out but she insisted on waiting for you...Crown Prince Valentine."

The mysterious female had heard their entrance and rushed to the foyer to meet Vincent.

"Oh, Vincent! It's been...so, so long..."

The prince's eyes widened and his breath caught. He took a step back and grabbed on to Yuffie's shoulder to keep his balance. The princess was also surprised and nearly dropped her tiny turtle to the ground, deftly catching it inches from the height she dropped it. It curled up into its shell, barely peeping out as Yuffie breathed a name no one thought she knew, and that Vincent dared not speak himself.

"Daughter of the leader of the Crescent Tribe from Wutai...infamous Wutain Restoration Foundation supporters...Lucrecia...Crescent..."


End file.
